NAIROBI, Kenya Jan 26 \u2013 Samburu Governor Lati Lelelit on Monday failed to appear before the Senate Public Accounts Committee to answer audit queries \u00a0but was reportedly present at a ruling party National Governing Council (NGC) meeting at State House.<\/p>\n
The no-show sparked outrage in the committee, which swiftly shifted its fire from the elusive governor to the Inspector General of Police, accusing him of shielding a fugitive of accountability and turning constitutional oversight into a game of hide-and-seek.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe told the Inspector General in no uncertain terms to find, arrest and produce the Governor before this committee today.Has the IG complied? We do not have anyone from the IG. That means the person in contempt of Parliament, besides the Governor, is the Inspector General of Police,\u201d said committee chair Moses Kajwang.<\/p>\n
The committee had directed the Inspector General of Police as early as December to arrest and present the governor, after repeated summons were ignored.<\/p>\n
The Office of the Inspector General later wrote asking for more time to trace the Samburu county boss \u00a0a claim that drew reactions after it emerged that the governor was attending a highly publicized political meeting in Statehouse.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the IG does not know how the Governor of Samburu looks like, we can forgive him. If he does not know where State House is, we can also forgive him. But the person has told us exactly where he is. How can the IG say he cannot find him?\u201dNairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna posed.<\/p>\n
Sifuna went further, accusing security agencies of having selective eyesight when it comes to arresting of influential person and in this case it\u2019s a travesty to accountability of public funds.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are the same police who can pick a young man in Homa Bay and drive him to Nairobi, or arrest an MP Kibagendi on Waiyaki Way and take him to Kisii. But they cannot locate a governor who is sitting at State House.We are being taken for granted,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Kitui Senator Enock Wambua suggested the disappearing act was not accidental but carefully choreographed with the explanations issued by the Office of the Inspector General invalid.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are the usual games being played by both the Governor and the IG. Maybe the IG knows he is about to leave office, so he is passing the problem to the next person.\u201d,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Senators were irated when Samburu Senator Lellegwe Lemein confirmed that the governor was indeed at the political meeting \u00a0and that he had little intention of showing up at the Senate anytime soon.<\/p>\n
\u201cI left the governor in statehouse sitted next to Governor Kihika\u2026This Governor is not ready and does not respect Parliament He has written excuse after excuse. Now he has the support of the IG not to attend. He believes that after paying a Sh500,000 fine, he can just keep skipping meetings..,\u201d Lellegwe said.<\/p>\n
Senators appeared unimpressed by the idea that party business could outrank constitutional duty with the Samburu Governor consistently ignoring the committee invitations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is not even a Cabinet meeting. It is a political party meeting, And I don\u2019t know any serious party that would be offended if you said you must first attend Parliament\u201d Sifuna said.<\/p>\n
Officials from the Office of the Auditor-General told the committee that Samburu County had not responded to audit recommendations for both the 2023\/2024 and 2024\/2025 financial years, even after the reports were formally submitted and tabled in Parliament.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe management has not given any updates on implementation of recommendations for both years,\u201d the office of the auditor general stated.<\/p>\n
The committee resolved to summon the Inspector General himself within seven days to explain why he had failed to execute Parliament\u2019s orders.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have been very fair. We have been very procedural, But we will not tolerate contempt of Parliament. The IG must come here and explain why he is not willing to facilitate oversight\u201d Kajwang\u2019 said.<\/p>\n
Senators also floated the idea of invoking constitutional provisions to block funds to counties in persistent breach, warning that oversight without enforcement had turned Parliament into a debating club.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we cannot talk about how money is spent, then we have no business sending more money there,\u201d Sifuna said.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NAIROBI, Kenya Jan 26 \u2013 Samburu Governor Lati Lelelit on Monday failed to appear before the Senate Public Accounts Committee to answer audit queries \u00a0but was reportedly present at a ruling party National Governing Council (NGC) meeting at State House. The no-show sparked outrage in the committee, which swiftly shifted its fire from the elusive […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-129562","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129562","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129562"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129562\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129562"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}