For years, vetting of nominees to public office has been reduced to a mere formality where applicants just tick a box as they wait to assume office.
At the heart of the formalities has been wealth declaration by the nominees, a critical part of vetting which has been left open to abuse for lack of a law guiding the process.
More often than not, the nominees are accorded a carte blanche by the vetting committee to throw in figures of their net worth without being taken to task to attach evidence supporting their declarations.
Consequently, nominees have exploited the grey area in vetting to mention figures that are either underestimations or overestimations, with the latter giving the nominees a headroom to amass ill-gotten wealth while in office.
Kenya's Parliament building.
Photo credit: File | Nation
However, Parliament has set in motion a process to cure the lacuna in law by seeking to make it mandatory for nominees provide evidence of their net worth during vetting in a bid to rein on wealth cheats.
The proposal is contained in a proposed legislation by Funyula MP Wilberforce Oundo which seeks to have nominees compelled to provide evidence of declared wealth during vetting.
Through the Public Appointments (County Assemblies Approval) Amendment Bill, 2025, the lawmaker wants all public nominees required to attach evidence of the wealth they own during vetting rather than just mention figures without supporting evidence.
The move is meant to cure the current gap in law where nominees such as cabinet secretaries or other public officers just mention what they are worth without attaching any report such as a valuation report to support the same.
For instance, during vetting, a nominee can just say he is worth Sh1 billion made up of land, houses, vehicles, shares in listed companies and money in the bank and it ends there, they are not compelled to disclose further or provide evidence of the actual value of the land their own based on a report by a valuer.
However, if the new proposed legislation by Dr Oundo is enacted into law, all nominees to public offices will be required to provide valuation reports of the land they own and other evidentiary materials to other properties they own to determine the actual amount stated.
“The proposal seeks to amend the Public Appointments (County Assemblies Approval) Act Cap.265B, to provide elaborate measures to ensure nominated individuals make accurate declarations of wealth by providing mandatory professional certification when seeking appointment in public offices,” reads the proposal.
Documents seen by Nation indicate that the Parliamentary Budget Office has already given the proposal a green light to proceed to the next stage. It has now been forwarded to the Directorate of legal services for further action and processing.
The Bill would make it mandatory for nominees to provide evidence, such as valuation reports, for all declared assets.
Photo credit: Shutterstock
According to Dr Oundo, the current law where nominees are not compelled to attach any evidence leads to over or under declaration of the exact wealth they own so as to leave room to plundering of public resources while in office upon approval by parliament.
“People keep on lying during vetting. They over state their wealth to leave room for stealing,” Dr Oundo said.
“All we need is verifiable documents of all the wealth they own including those of assets and liabilities,” added the lawmaker.
At the moment, it is the Clerk of the National Assembly that writes to the agencies and the Office of the Registrar of Political Parties requesting for reports with respect to the nominees on matters of ethics and integrity, tax compliance, criminal records, higher education loan repayments and political party affiliations.
The bodies are just supposed to provide the information of the respective to the nominee which will be availed to the committee during vetting. It is now upon members of the committee to peruse the documents and ask the questions.
Section 6 (9) of the public appointments (parliamentary approval) Act of 2011 provides that “any person may, prior to the approval hearing and by written statement on oath, provide the clerk with evidence contesting the suitability of a candidate to hold the office to which the candidate has been nominated.
Nominee for Youth affairs Sports and Arts Cabinet Secretary nominee Ababu Namwamba in front of committee for vetting on October 21,2022.
Photo credit: Sila Kiplagat I Nation Media Group
This is the second time the National Assembly will be attempting to tighten the vetting rules especially for Cabinet Secretaries.
In the 12th parliament, various proposals were floated seeking to amend the Parliamentary Approval Act 2011 that guides the vetting process.
Although the lawmakers increased the vetting period from the initial 14 days to 28, other parts that could have raised the integrity probe and higher academic level for the Cabinet Secretary nominees were never considered by the House.
Some of the proposals then included having representatives from investigative agencies such as Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC), Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA), Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) and Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) physically present during the vetting of the nominees so as to ask critical questions on matters of integrity and taxes.
In bringing representatives of the bodies on board during the vetting process, the MPs argued that Parliament is not competent to check criminal background of nominees hence it is the agencies that can ask such critical questions.
However, the move was shelved as there were fears that it would compromise the separation of powers and parliament would have been seen to have ceded its functions to other bodies.
The committee on Appointments chaired by the speaker which normally conducts the vetting of CSs also wanted section 9 of the approval act amended by deleting the provision which provides that after the expiry of the period of consideration and parliament has neither approved nor rejected nomination of a candidate, the candidate shall be deemed approved.
On the questionnaire bit, the committee proposed amendment of question 28 which currently just asks whether a nominee has been charged in a court of law, the committee instead wanted the nominee to be asked about conviction and status of a case if appealed. This would have provided an avenue to reject or put aside the vetting of the nominee until he concludes his case.
