The Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) Homicide detectives attached to Kilimani Police Station in Nairobi are seeking to piece together circumstantial evidence and motive behind the killing of the 40 years’ old Nairobi Hospital acting Finance Director Eric Maigo who was found murdered at his Woodley Estate home in Nairobi yesterday.
In what manifest a gruesome and brutal murder, Maigo’s lifeless body was found lying in a pool of blood.
According to preliminary police findings, Maigo sustained ten stab wounds to the chest and six more on the side pointing to a possible calculated execution plot.
An identified woman who is reportedly said to be a prime suspect is still at large.
Through an internal memo to the Nairobi Hospital staff, hospital Chief Executive Officer (CEO) James Nyamongo confirmed the death.
“This morning we received the shocking news of the death of our staff member, Mr. Eric Maigo, who was our Ag. Director of Finance. Unconfirmed reports we have at the moment are that Eric’s lifeless body was found by the neighbours at his house at 6am.” The memo read in part.
Nairobi Hospital Acting Finance Director Eric Maigo was on Friday found dead at his Woodley home, in what is suspected to be murder.
According to police reports, Maigo’s body was found with 16 stab wounds, 10 at the chest and the others on his sides.
Police are still carrying out a probe into the matter, but they say a woman who was reportedly with the deceased at the time of his death is the prime suspect in the murder.
Maigo’s death had been reported by Nairobi Hospital CEO James Nyamongo through an internal memo.
Nyamongo mourned his member of staff saying the body was found by his neighbours at around 6am, adding that the family had been informed and an investigation was already underway.
Nairobi Hospital is not new to controversies and has in the past been marred by claims of multi-million tender fights, financial impropriety and high vaulted leadership wrangles.
In 2020, former sacked Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Dr. Allan Pamba attributed his forced exit to multi-million tenders including the then newly opened 100 bed capacity Covid-19 hospital launched by retired president Uhuru Kenyatta valued at Sh1.1billion.
Through court filings, Pamba who is demanding Sh218.8million in compensation for unfair dismissal links his ouster to his awarding the construction contract to China Wu Yi instead of Quest Civil Engineering Limited.
China Wu Yi had initially been recommended for the job by hospital’s tender committee owing to what they termed as “stronger technical capabilities.”
However, the board initiated machinations to overturn the award through unorthodox means in favour of Quest Civil Engineering Limited, a move that Pamba opposed.
Further, Pamba declined to ‘create a need’ for a fully funded Sh118 million tender for the installation of a new security system for the hospital since there was an existing efficiently functioning system.
According to his submissions in court, the board was pushing the ‘unprioritised’ security tender be awarded to Opticom Kenya.
Further, in November 2020, a report by an audit firm report revealed how Nairobi Hospital has made a loss worth Sh2.2billion in 2019/2020 fiscal year.
Failure to follow the basic financial rules by the former management of the Nairobi Hospital leading to the mismanagement of funds put the hospital on the spot for making losses.
The then and still serving board chairperson Irungu Ndirangu commissioned the audit to investigate the handling of the hospital’s finances. The report reveals that there are unexplained revenue irregularities between two internal billing systems, Kranium and Navision, in billing and receipts.
“As of December 31, 2019, the total inpatient and outpatient revenue recorded on Kranium for the Financial Year 2019-20 amounted to Ksh12.8 billion. The total revenue recorded on Navision amounted to Ksh10.6 billion resulting in an unexplained variance of Ksh2.2 billion. This is equivalent to two months’ revenue.” The report reads in part.
Further, the report showed a variation gap amounting to Sh2.8 billion.
Furthermore, it showed that orders were not the main point of discussion during their meetings except for one discussion carried out on the fourth finance and investment committee meeting held in 2019.
There was also a lack of project records, policies and procedures and payments to projects without contracts, which amounted to Sh1.4 billion.
According to the report, there were three different project lists from three different sources and they were awarded to one supplier.
Further, there were unfair procurement practices of C-arm machine that carries out an endoscopy.
“During the review of suppliers’ pre-qualification, we noted that some of the service providers did not submit mandatory documents such as completed trade reference forms, latest audited accounts, tax compliance certificates, completed supplier code of ethics and signed an affidavit on bidder litigation history for the last three years,” Says the report.
The document called for disciplinary action to be carried out on the staff that interfered with the procurement processes as the report cited several messages between the hospital staff and suppliers.
In December 2019, the hospital was owed Sh2.8 billion. It says out of 25 debtors contacted, only one responded and disputed the debt as per the hospital books.
In June 2021, the board confirmed James Nyamongo as the facility’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO) after he was appointed as the acting CEO on a six-month probationary term in December 2020.
