Union puts Kemri on the spot over Sh2bn
Health CS Susan Nakhumicha. She has said the ministry is looking into allegations of financial impropriety at Kemri.
The Kenya Medical Research Institute (Kemri) is on the spot following questions on its spending of Sh2.28 billion, irregular hiring of staff and failure to account for donor funds.
In a letter to Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua and investigative agencies through their union, senior staff want answers on how the management used the money. The letter states that since July 2019, the institution has received Sh2.28 billion for staff allowance, however, this has not been remitted to the workers.
“The union’s concern is that to date, the Kemri management cannot account for Sh2.28 billion. Our request for the status and whereabouts of these funds from the Kemri director-general has never been responded to,” states the letter seen by the Nation.
“The management’s failure to account for the monies is against the Public Finance Management Act, 2012, which provides that government resources must be used in a way that is lawful, authorised, effective, efficient, economical and transparent,” the employees state.
In the letter dated November 11, 2022, the Union of Kenya Civil Servants further states that it has received complaints from its members regarding serious misappropriation of funds, which are alleged to have been diverted to political campaigns.
It is also alleged the institution received Sh473 million from the National Treasury for payment of staff risk and extraneous allowances for 38 months but this was not paid. They further allege that the institution cannot account for donor funds estimated at Sh1.2 billion. The funds are claimed to have been misused by a senior officer. The same officer is accused of mismanaging an imprest of Sh12 million as per an internal audit report.
“This is likely to affect research programs at Kemri which heavily rely on donor funding,” states the letter.
The letter also identified illegal promotion and appointment of officers at the institution: “The union is aware that the Kemri board and management promoted an officer to the position of deputy director (head of the internal audit) a position that was not vacant. This is an example of abuse of office by some senior managers.”
“It is important to note that after the advertisement of the vacancy of the same post, the said officer was the only applicant hence lack of competition in filling the same post,” it adds.
CS aware
Health Cabinet Secretary Susan Nakhumicha told the Nation that she is aware of the issues and that she had held meetings with the two principal secretaries in the ministry to look into them.
“They will get to interrogate the issues at the institution, dig deeper and come up with a plan for managing the issues. An investigative team will be put together in the coming weeks to find out more about the issues,” she said.
She said that since she joined the ministry, she found that people are running them as private entities.
“I am going to align them, just give me time,” she said.
“These are public funds and if a donor puts in money to assist in research, then it should do what it is supposed to do and not get into people’s pockets. I will do the policing and we must get to the bottom of this,” she said.
