Kenya Insights

Tag: NGO

  • Prof Lunyangapuo Led West Pokot County Spent Sh300Million On Boreholes Constructed By An NGO

    Prof Lunyangapuo Led West Pokot County Spent Sh300Million On Boreholes Constructed By An NGO

    Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) is investigating West Pokot County’s Water Department for embezzlement of Sh300 million meant to construct boreholes that had already been set up by Pokot Outreach Ministries, a non-governmental organisation operating in the large Pokot area.

    EACC sleuths drawn from Eldoret and Nairobi offices stormed and seized assorted documents from the Kapenguria offices. Some staffs at the Water Department who are implicated in the payment of the dubious projects have recorded their statements.

    “I want to confirm to you that we shall be summoning several senior staff from the water section including the immediate water chief executive officer Milka Psiwa to shed light on how they spent the money,” the official told Citizen Weekly journos in Kapenguria shortly after visiting the officers in focus.

    Governor Lonyangapuo

    “For sure, nobody will be spared once we are through with the investigations that will see several personnel facing the wrath of the law,” the official from the EACC said, adding that the investigations were at an advanced stage.

    According to EACC reports, Officials from the Water Department spent funds from West Pokot County funds with documents stating that they had drilled boreholes at Kacheliba, Kapenguria, Sigor and some parts of Chepareria. Each borehole is said to have swallowed over Sh15 million.

    “We want the West Pokot governor John Lonyangapou to tell us on which criteria did the county government use to pay money on projects that had already been funded by his organisation,” Rev Julius Murgor, the director of the non-governmental organisation that has been involved in the drilling of boreholes 

    Murgor stated that EACC officials had written to him requesting that his NGO, Pokot Outreach Ministries confirm how many boreholes they had drilled boreholes in the entire West Pokot County.

    “How can the County Government pay Sh 300 million that is supposed to be public fund to projects that we have already been completed with our own funds?” Rev Murgor asked.

    In his defense, Governor Lonyangapou, after jetting in from America where he had gone on an official trip while accompanying Milka Psiwa who then was heading the department in question before being moved to the health docket, said that he was not aware that funds from his County had been used to pay the said projects. The talkative governor added that those involved should prepare to carry their own cross.

    Kapenguria MP Samuel Moroto, Kacheliba MP Mark Lomolokol and his Sigor counterpart Peter Lochakapong have while commenting on the issue, stated that those implicated in the loot should be prosecuted.

    West Pokot county Speaker Catherine Mukenyang also urged that those involved in the looting of public funds should not be spared by the law. Her statement was seconded by Senator Samuel Poghisio who challenged Lonyangapou to come out clean over the fraud.

    Rev John Lodinyo of Kiwawa parish said it is time those involved were made to face the law with immediate effect. With former-immediate, West Pokot governor Simon Kachapin said that those involved should be in jail.

     

  • NGOs Coordination CEO Fazul Mahamed Summoned By CID, Threatened Life Of Staff Who Questioned His Fake Degree

    NGOs Coordination CEO Fazul Mahamed Summoned By CID, Threatened Life Of Staff Who Questioned His Fake Degree

    The NGO Coordination Board chairman Fazul Mahamed
    The NGO Coordination Board chairman Fazul Mahamed

    The ghost of forgery continues to haunt NGOs’ Coordination Board chairman Fazul Mahamed. Earlier in the year, Fazul was grilled by EACC about the authenticity of the degree he used to gain employment, following complaints from the board.

    According to information reaching Kenya Insights, a senior staff member sitting in the NGO’s board has been threatened with harmful consequences from the CEO, Fazul. The staff member according to a source speaking to us had questioned the credentials of the CEO. This isn’t new as it is in the public domain that he forged his academic papers. Fazul, who according to several reports has been defensive and easily pissed off at anyone who dare, question his papers.

    Fazul served in NACADA, has been accused, and detectives followed trails of his questionable education trail. With the accusations, the CEO has been fraudulently earning the salary with forged documents.

    According to files he presented to the boards during NACADA and NGO’s Coordination interviews; Fazul stated he was a Biochemistry graduate from Egerton University in 2009. Contrarily, in 2015, Egerton University Registrar of academic affairs, Prof SFO Owido said Mahamed Yusuf, as Fazul was known in college, was discontinued on academic grounds in his third year of study by the Senate on August 26, 2010.

    In a letter to the National Council of NGOs dated September 10, 2015, Owido said Mahamed was admitted as a regular student in 2007 to pursue a Bachelor of Science in Agriculture. He changed the course through an inter-faculty transfer on September 27, 2007, Owido said. He said Mahamed was discontinued for failing 50 percent or more of all the credit factors taken in the regular exams of one academic year.

    fake2
    Letter from Egerton University denouncing Fazul’s supposed certificate

    Police detectives who were trailing his roots at one point interrogated his father in Naivasha, where he admitted his son had dropped out of Egerton University and the next thing he knew, Fazul was working in the government. Some sources also say he transferred to UoN, but there’s no evidence to ascertain this claim neither himself. He doesn’t point that out in his CV.

    So where did Fazul get his papers when the university he claims to have graduated from disowned him. Why should taxpayers continue paying someone who’s legitimately not qualified to occupy the position
    Critics have reiterated that the due process wasn’t adhered to during the CEO’s recruiting and flawed vetting process.

    Apparently, there’s no evidence that he underwent vetting in the first place. One such fundamental requirement that Fazul didn’t meet calls for The board’s executive director to have served for ten years in public service and held a master’s degree which he clearly doesn’t measure up to.

    Fazul is not new to controversy, in 2014 when the country was faced with severe terrorist attacks, by then an NACADA official, he blamed the opposition for working with Al-Shabaab to destabilise the Jubilee government a floppy blame that has been doing rounds amongst government’s proponents whenever Kenya is hit.

    In his reign in the NGOs’ board, Fazul shocked many when he deregistered nearly 6000 NGOs he primarily accused of funding terror activities.

    MUHURI, HAKI Africa were just but some of the many organisations that were suspended and accounts frozen. Fazul accused them of working with terror elements and funding their activities. After investigations, the groups were found stain free and resumed activities of fighting for human rights.

    Fazul has insisted questions on his academic credentials rose as a result of what he calls transformative actions in the sector by banning some organisations. To date, Fazul is yet to convince anyone entirely how he acquired his certificates. The threats case is being handled by detectives based in Nairobi’s central police, and the temperate CEO would face charges in court.