The National Assembly Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is responsible for the examination of the accounts showing the appropriations of the sum voted by the House to meet the public expenditure and of such other accounts laid before the House. It comprises 15 Members of Parliament namely;

This week, PAC has had several committee sittings with stakeholders from State Departments for the purposes of examining the report of the Auditor-General for the financial year 2020/2021. The Committee had a meeting with the State Law Office, State Department for the ASALs and Regional Development, and the State Department for Wildlife. The Committee is scheduled to meet with the State Department for Blue Economy and Fisheries, The Judiciary, Judicial Service Commission, and the State Department for Mining on Thursday 20th April 2023. Further, The Committee was scheduled to meet with the National Treasury Friday.

In the meetings held by the Committee, several issues were raised and the Auditor-General gave qualified opinions on the various State Departments’ financial reports. The Auditor-General gave a qualified opinion on the accuracy and completeness of the expenditure on compensation of employees of Kshs.1,268,188,315 by the State Law Office. Further, there were issues with the deduction from the payrolls, the amount of Kshs.3,934,100, in respect of the 3% payroll commission charge which was not recorded in the books of account as revenue.  

The Committee also noted from the Auditor-General’s report under-funding from the State Department of ASALs and Regional Development budget, where the department expended Kshs.7,797,351,637 against an approved budget of Kshs.8,736,173,586 resulting in an under-expenditure of Kshs.938,821,949 or 11% of the budget. The Committee also noted there were also pending bills amounting to Kshs.34,253,871 as at 30 June 2021, comprising Kshs.29,258,465 outstanding in the current financial year 2020/2021 and Kshs.4,995,406 outstanding from prior years which were not settled.

The Committee raised an issue with projects works done where projects’ files for works amounting to Kshs.48,545,210 did not have contractor’s mandatory requirements at the time of award which includes tax compliance certificates, National Construction Authority (NCA) registration certificates, tender evaluation minutes as required by the Public Procurement and Asset Disposal Act, (2015). Some of the responses submitted to the Committee revealed that Uthbii Holdings was awarded a tender for construction and received payments before incorporation contrary to Public Procurement and Asset Disposal Act, 2015.

The Committee hearing from the State Department of Wildlife raised issues with the Auditor-General’s qualified opinion on payment of Kshs.29,924,704 with respect to five vehicles that had not been delivered as at 30 June 2021. There was no agreement presented for audit detailing the conditions for payment and the period within which the vehicles were to be delivered. The Committee was puzzled upon learning from the report that the supplier had also been paid in full before delivering the goods.  

The Committee is scheduled to meet all State Departments in the coming weeks in relation to the examination of accounts as reported by the Auditor-General.