Probe exposes official rot at City Hall

An official investigation into the affairs of the City Council of Nairobi unearthed massive corruption.
The report exposed how three Cabinet ministers, the mayor and his deputy, chief officers, and councillors were all at the heart of a gravy train that was fleecing the council.

Local Government minister Joseph Kamotho received the Extraordinary Inspection on the Nairobi City Council report on March 27, 2000, from the 14-member committee led by John Mbogua.

However, he refused to make it public until October 26, when the Daily Nation published its details.

The Mbogua report detailed various ills, including abuse of office, conflict of interest, forgery, illegal allotment of services, undervaluation, land grabbing, irregular business transactions, and hiring of ghost workers.

Companies linked to Cabinet ministers Francis Lotodo and two of his colleagues were doing business with City Hall in what was clearly a conflict of interest.

One of the ministers and his wife owned one of the 25 debt collection firms doing business with the council.

DEBT COLLECTION FIRMS
A deputy mayor and six councillors also owned debt collection firms. These firms were appointed without the authorisation of a council meeting and their payment was not part of the approved budget.

Another minister was accused of unduly influencing the appointment of his insurance company as an agent of City Hall.

Between 1997 and 1999, it received an excess payment of Sh31 million for the premiums it had sold.

The minister was further accused of dishing out council houses and plots meant for the construction of public utilities.

A former mayor was accused of inflating the rent of a council house in Fedha estate to Sh80,000, up from Sh25,000.

SUPPLY OF WATER METERS

He further influenced the award of a Sh29.4 million tender to a company he was associated with to supply water meters.

Two former town clerks were accused of systematically looting NCC assets. One paid university fees for his two daughters using Sh1.05 million from the council’s coffers.

City chief officers were not left out, with accusations that they oversaw the grabbing NCC assets.

One chief officer was accused of fleecing the NCC of Sh45.5 million, between April and May 1999.

Between February and September 1999, companies owned by NCC workers and chief officers fraudulently received Sh60.9 million for supplying various goods and services.

GHOST WORKERS

The report further alleged that the NCC had 10,707 ghost workers among its 21,413 employees.

Yet, the NCC’s monthly wage bill was Sh2.2 billion, which comprised 90 per cent of its total revenue.

The report revealed how NCC had bought spare parts for its three lorries at an inflated price of Sh3.6 million; their market price was Sh1.7 million.

NCC also lost millions of shillings in legal fees by hiring more than 200 external lawyers without terminating the services of those it had initially hired.

Yet, all this rot at NCC would have probably been avoided if the government had simply implemented plans proposed by previous investigation teams.

For instance, a 1983 investigation recommended the dissolution of the NCC, but the proposal was met with public censure.

The Mbogua report recommended the arrest and persecution of all those implicated in the corruption.

OPEN TENDERING

Other recommendations were downsizing, recruiting only highly qualified staff, open tendering, and allowing only the Local Government Ministry to allocate council land.

It also recommended that the Financial Management and Control Board of NCC handle all its dealings and transactions for the next two years.

The report elicited different reactions from those who had been implicated, with most of them dismissing it as “unfair”.

Town clerks, councillors and chief officers denied the allegations.

Kamotho, who had previously ignored the report, began cleaning up the NCC.

He retired Town Clerk Ziporah Wandera and director of planning Kuria wa Gathoni.

He also sacked 5,334 workers.

The chief officers mentioned in the report were sent on forced leave.

But the government ministers, one of whom admitted that he owned the company alleged to have done business with the council, were left untouched.