PSC: Civil servants stole Sh227m last year
The government lost Sh226.71 million due to corruption-related acts reported in 20 public institutions in 2021.
What you need to know:
- The Public Service Commission said of the amount that only Sh1.71 million was recovered.
- Last August EACC recommended the prosecution of at least 20 public officials.
The government lost Sh226.71 million due to corruption-related acts reported in 20 public institutions last year, a new report shows.
The Public Service Commission (PSC) said of the amount that only Sh1.71 million was recovered — an indication of hardened and sophisticated criminality by workers in some public institutions.
This came even as the number of establishments with reported cases of graft in the civil service dropped from 47 in Financial Year (FY) 2019/20 to 20 in 2020/21. The number of reported cases also fell from 427 to 188.
“The number of cases prosecuted in court improved from 132 in 2019/2020 to 146 in 2020/2021 while the cases referred for administrative action declined from 222 in 2019/2020 to 66 in the financial year 2020/2021,” the PSC said.
The report also shows that the number of convicted officers rose from eight in the 2019/20 financial year to 12 in 2020/21.
Abuse of office
The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) last August recommended the prosecution of at least 20 public officials, including a Principal Secretary (PS), for alleged abuse of office, fraud, theft of public funds, and bribery.
Those whose files were forwarded to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) included the PS in the State Department of Fisheries, Aquaculture, and the Blue Economy over procurement irregularities in one of President Kenyatta’s key legacy projects for the Coast region.
The file involves inquiry into allegations of irregular procurement of the Sh1 billion ultra-modern fish hub at Liwatoni Fisheries Complex in Mombasa County.
The EACC’s annual quarterly report covering April 1 to June 30, 2021 states that, investigations revealed that the PS started tendering process of Phase Two of the project with no approved budget or procurement plan. The report appears in last week’s Kenya Gazette notice.
Another file the EACC recommended for prosecution involved a former regional manager for Kenya Rural Roads Authority (Kerra) accused of money laundering and acquisition of public property amounting to Sh2.3 billion.
The EACC commenced investigations on the manager following a report that he had received payments amounting to Sh2.3 billion from several public entities through companies associated with him.
