In a movie-thriller like narration on how basic guidelines of the Public Management Finance Act 2012 were blatantly thrown out of the window, it has now been laid bare that the medical authority expended a whooping Sh 5.1billion without authority.
However, for a parastatal to by-pass parent ministry to request for such a budget and the National Treasury having advanced the taxpayers money without querying the glaring flouting of PMF Act 2012 where it is domiciled only paints a choreographed scheme that makes the drugs agency, Ministry of Health (MoH) and the National Treasury complicit of a looting spree.
Yesterday, MoH Principal Secretary Susan Mochache said the Kenya Medical Supplies Agency (Kemsa) senior managers spent Sh 5.1 billion in procuring Covid-19 items without approval of the Health ministry.
Inadvertently, this also indicts Kemsa board chaired by Kembi Gitura charged with the mandate of policy guidance and budgetary approvals.
As the coronavirus ravaged the country, masterminds of the heist believed to be jointly from Kemsa, MoH and the National Treasury were busy plundering the public coffers.
She said Kemsa, then headed by sacked Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Jonah Manjari wrote to the National Treasury seeking for monies contravening the PMF Act.
“The letter to Treasury was not procedural, the matter should have gone through Afya House” she said.
She added that the National Treasury informed her that Kemsa when making the request, did not say whether the commitment was made without confirmation of availability of funds.
She added that it also raised concerns that the request was made directly to them, while by passing the Ministry of Health contrary to channel requests through the accounting officer.
“I am equally baffled on how this matter unfolded yet the law is clear you don’t spend what you don’t have.
The question is why they disregarded the Ministry of Health. If you look keenly, you can see how the management tried to look for money to justify this, we need to find out what was the motivation behind this,” she said.
She added: “My conscience is very clear, I made every effort to find out what was going on at Kemsa and at some point, I even confronted the Chief Executive Officer over the theft claims but I was told there was nothing like that,” she added.
Mochache says individual responsibility should apply in punishing those behind suspected loss of Sh2.3 billion.
She spoke while appearing before the Public Investments Committee (PIC) of the National Assembly.
The PS told MPs that in a meeting on March 18, the ministry resolved to buy 25,000 PPE, 10,000 KN95 face masks and 6,000 Covid-19 testing kits.
A day later the ministry conveyed to Kemsa a decision to purchase additional 6,000 laboratory test kits.
Instead of this, Kemsa procured 1.6 million KN95 face masks, 9,900 N95 face masks as well as 5,000 of another category of mask known as N95 (1860).
Kemsa also acquired 21,646 infrared thermometers, 126,000 PPE, 32,190 face shields, 26,000 pairs of goggles, 126,700 50-pack surgical gloves and 2,190 50-pack gloves.
Also procured were 330,000 500-ml hand sanitiser, 75 ventilators and 21 million three-ply disposable masks.
Mochache told the committee that she was shocked to learn that the Kemsa bosses had bypassed the ministry and overshot the budget.
On June 2, 2020, Manjari wrote to Treasury Cabinet Secretary Ukur Yatani requesting for Sh5.1 billion funding to cater for the excess items.
The PS told the committee chaired by Mvita MP Abdulswamad Nassir that she was at a loss about the “stakeholders” Kemsa management referred to in their letter to Yatani.
The agency ended up sourcing Covid-19 response items for Sh7 billion in less than three weeks, and is reportedly still receiving some bits despite the directive by investigative agencies looking into the purchases.
Mochache told PIC that the ministry only approved purchases of Sh758 million as communicated to Kemsa on March 18.
“We learned that they had mobilised emergency supplies worth Sh5.1 billion after the Treasury PS wrote to me on the budget request,” she told the committee.
The PS added that the list which specified the items to be bought and the companies which were to supply them was from Kemsa.
“The document was first from them. I didn’t instruct Kemsa on what to buy, where and at how much,” she said.
The PS said that the ministry on April 6 learned that Kemsa had procured items worth Sh2.1 billion, most of which were not in the approved list.
“Kemsa was asked to rationalise the budget to align it with what the ministry had been allocated for PPE, which was Sh758 million,” the PS explained.
Lawmakers queried why the ministry did not stop further purchases at that stage, having realised there was no budget for the items.
MPs Nassir, T.J Kajwang (Ruaraka), Babu Owino (Embakasi East), Mary Wamaua (Maragua), Julius Melly (Tinderet), Rahab Mukami (Nyeri), Esther Passaris (Nairobi), Abdisalan Ibrahim (Wajir North) and Omar Maalim (Mandera East) raised questions on what may have motivated Kemsa to act in the manner it did.
Kajwang asked why the ministry did not question how Kemsa managed to adjust their Sh2.1 billion supplies proposal to fit the Sh758 million budget.
He asked whether it was the PS’s statutory duty to approve procurement of any nature at an independent agency.
Nassir said the grant question is why Kemsa proceeded with sourcing goods after the supplies were flagged in an internal memo which stated that the purchases had stretched to Sh4 billion.
“Why did they continue receiving goods after the internal memo by procurement director Charles Juma 23 days that commitment letters had got to Sh3.9 billion? They even committed another Sh2 billion in total disregard of the resolutions of a meeting with ministry,” the MP noted.
“Even after the April 24 memo by Juma, the figure shot to Sh7 billion. We have information that the management is still receiving goods. On whose authority and advisory was this done? Was there a needs assessment?” Nassir asked.
Mochache said: “I am baffled. The law is clear that you don’t spend what you don’t have and on how procurement should be undertaken no matter what circumstances. I am equally perplexed they were looking for money retrospectively.”
