The review of the Standing Orders by the 12th Parliament that saw the Public Investments Committee (PIC) split into three has increased scrutiny of financial operations of State Corporations.
The giant PIC, which had 250 State Corporations to deal with in a financial year, was split into the Public İnvestments Committee on Commercial Affairs and Energy, the Public İnvestments Committee on Governance and Education and the Public İnvestments Committee on Social Services Administration and Agriculture.
Records in Parliament indicate that, so far, the three committees have examined financial reports of over 85 State Corporations since the inception of the 13th Parliament last year.
There has been remarkable progress since the changes were made. When the PIC was operating as one unit in the entire life of the 12th Parliament, the committee only managed to examine records of 30 State Corporations, citing factors such as a huge backlog and a huge workload.
Auditor General Nancy Gathungu.
Photo credit: File
In March this year, the National Assembly Audit Committees had a roundtable engagement with key stakeholders including the office of the Auditor-General, Controller of Budget, Chief Executive Officer Institute of Economic Affairs, Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, among others.
She expressed disappointment over the number of heads of State Corporations serving their terms and leaving office without their work being audited.
There is no where to hide for State Corporations that previously hid their financial operations due to the workload that prevent PIC from acting quickly. The three committees have now produced damning reports on the status of some corporations.
For instance, the Public Investments Committee on Social Services Administration and Agriculture fingered 10 Cabinet Secretaries for micromanaging State Corporations under their respective ministries by failing to operationalise their functions in order to operate independently as envisioned under the law.
President William Ruto has been scoring major wins in Parliament.
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The committee accused the CSs of holding a tight grip on 23 State Corporations with a budgetary allocation of over Sh4 billion that were under their ministries.
These corporations have never been audited since inception yet each financial year they receive millions of shillings.
This has raised questions over the prudent utilisation of the taxpayers’ money that the National Treasury has been channelling to these corporations. The report indicates that the corporations have failed to submit their financial statements for auditing.
The committee pointed out that the parent ministries are deliberately micro-managing the State Corporations, hence denying them funding to provide the intended services to the public.
The committee noted that despite the State Corporations receiving money from the public through member registration and subscription fee, the money was not audited as they failed to prepare financial statements of account raising fears of possible mismanagement of the billions they received from the exchequer.
Bumula MP Jack Wamboka, who chairs the Public İnvestments Committee on Governance and Education, said so far they have examined financial accounts of 57 State Corporations.
“This report recommends further investigation of certain matters by the relevant investigative agencies such as the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission and the Directorate of Criminal Investigations. All this is geared towards ensuring prudent use of public resources”, Mr Wamboka said while tabling the report.
