Lack of accountability in Kenya Medical Supplies Agency (Kemsa) is a phenomenon that must stop as it is costing citizens dearly.
Damning revelations of disappearing drugs from Kemsa warehouse by the Global Fund, for example, means that the country risks losing Sh50.6 billion in support to HIV/Aids, tuberculosis and malaria control and treatment programmes.
Global Fund, which finances the fight against HIV/Aids, tuberculosis and malaria, has also raised the red flag over suspected fake suppliers demanding Sh1.66 billion from Kemsa.
The lost medicines are believed to have been stolen and resold on the black market and to private chemists, shining a spotlight once again on Kemsa over its graft record.
Equally worrying is the government’s lackadaisical attitude to dealing with such cases and the State agency has security.
The agency now plans to install a larger number of surveillance cameras at its main warehouse in Nairobi’s Embakasi area raising the question if the security which was there before didn’t have the mandate to curb embarrassing theft of stocks.
The agency on Tuesday advertised a tender for the supply of nearly 100 high tech CCTV cameras in a bid to improve security at its facilities in the wake of an incident where drugs, condoms and other products worth millions of shillings disappeared from the depot.
The tender is for the supply of three Dome CCTV cameras the basic type of security camera meant for indoor installation.
The authority specifies the dome cameras it wants as efficient H.265+ compression technology, with ability to focus on human and vehicle targets classification based on deep learning and with audio and alarm interface.
Kemsa was also accused of overstating the value of medicines by Sh640 million, with some types of drugs having been inflated 100 times, says an audit by Global Fund.
Some of the drugs, which were bought by cash from Global Fund, expired amid a shortfall in government hospitals.
The revelations come as Kemsa battles to clean its image after the State agency was engulfed in tender fraud over the procurement of Covid-19 medical supplies in 2020.
The anti-graft agency cited irregular expenditure of Sh7.8 billion following tenders allegedly given to politically connected individuals and businesses.
Now, Global Fund’s anti-graft unit – the Office of Inspector General (OIG) – has recommended further investigation of Kemsa in a move that could put its Sh50.6 billion funding to Kenya at risk.
Since 2003, the Global Fund has disbursed over $1.4 (Sh159.6) billion to Kenya to help fight HIV/Aids, tuberculosis, malaria, and most recently the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Kemsa has poor internal controls on warehousing and inventory management, resulting in 16 percent differences in batch numbers verified, and discrepancies of 908,000 long-lasting insecticidal nets (LLINs) between actual and expected stock balances,” says the Global Fund’s report.
“We identified 165 long outstanding/undelivered local purchase orders (LPOs) valued at $14.5 million (Sh1.66 billion).
The high number of LPOs without an attached delivery notes poses the risk of fake suppliers or diverted procurements.”
