Magoha Disputes a Report on Allowances of Sh10 million by Declaring: “I’m ready to go to jail.”

George Magoha, the cabinet secretary for education, and his employees were reportedly compensated with more than Sh10 million in allowances for traveling the nation “to supervise the distribution of lockers and desks” in schools, according to reports.

The CS has since come forward to defend the payments. In order to make sure that projects are carried out properly, Prof. Magoha stated on Monday that he wants to personally examine them.

“I go to commission projects because I don’t trust anybody. I must make sure that I’m not given reports that can’t be verified. It’s so much better to go to jail because you went to inspect something that is there that cannot be carried away, instead of being praised for or accused of spending money that was used on something that’s not there.”

In Thika West, Kiambu County, Prof. Magoha spoke on Monday as he inaugurated a CBC classroom at Chania Girls High School. In order to boost capacity before the transfer to junior secondary school in January of next year, he recently started Phase II of the project, which aims to add 3,503 classrooms to the 6,497 that were built in Phase I.

The Ministry of Education’s top management was criticized for spending more than Sh10 million in 2020 to pay daily subsistence allowances to staff members working from Nairobi headquarters to oversee the distribution of desks in schools. This was according to Auditor-General Nancy Gathungu’s most recent audit report. She asserted that the task could have been completed at “little or no cost” at all by employees at county offices.

“The state department has established offices in all counties and the staff in these offices could have been used with minimal or no costs. This expenditure was therefore against Section 79(2b) of the Public Finance Management Act, 2012 which states that a public officer employed in a National Government state organ or public entity should ensure that resources within the officer’s area of responsibility are used in a way that is lawful and authorized and effective, efficient, economical and transparent,” the report reads in part. 

The effort to build desks and lockers was a component of the Covid-19 economic stimulus program, which aimed to promote regional artisans whose companies had been severely damaged by the epidemic while also aiding in social exclusion.

Meanwhile, the CS asked contractors across the nation to speed up the development of education projects during the visit to Kiambu on Monday.

He also said that teachers would receive upgrades on the Competency Based Curriculum (CBC) through school-based programs after schools resumed their regular academic schedules in January.