Education Ministry On The Spot As Questions Emerge Over Ksh.4.5B Spent On CBC Classes
The National Assembly Public Accounts Committee (PAC) now wants a special audit conducted on the expenditure of Ksh.4.5 billion that was spent in establishing classes for the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC).
The committee is seeking to determine how the money was used, how the contractors were procured, and if Kenyans got value for money from the venture.
This was after Basic Education Principal Secretary Dr. Belio Kipsang on Tuesday told the committee that the ministry had used the community to choose the contractors that were involved in the project.
It was an assertion that was vehemently rejected by the committee members who refuted the claims and demanded evidence on how the community was involved in choosing which contractor would be building a class in a certain school.
“There was no community participation, the process was undertaken by the Director of County Education How can you say there was community participation, and yet MPs who represent the people never knew? charged Funyula MP Oundo Mudenyo.
“You could walk into a school and find a class being constructed and you are told it is a CBC program class,” he added.
On his part, Rarieda MP Otiende Omollo submitted: “I have no idea who the contractors were in Rarieda Constituency. I have no idea how they were procured. So we need to be convinced by evidence on how the community was involved in determining the contractors.”
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However, the PS remained adamant that the community was involved, as they only targeted people who were capable of building the classes, through the multi-agency team.
“I have to indicate that this was done through a multi-agency team, and we will provide evidence of those who registered and how the information was taken down to the chief’s office. The persons we targeted out of necessity were contractors, and those are the ones we communicated to,” he said.
The MPs also took issue with the quality of the classes, questioning whether the Kenyan taxpayer got value for money.
The MPs wondered why the contractors were paid their full amount against the requirements of the law, meaning the taxpayer might have to spend more in fixing defective classes.
“When you are homeless, and you are being rained on, you can take shelter under a tree that will not mean that the tree is habitable, that is what happened in my Lugari constituency, and all the classes were poorly done,” said Lugari MP Nabii Nabwera
“There is a special audit ongoing on the quality of the buildings, but to the extent that we have seen, we acknowledge that there could be some that could be having some defects, but the classes are being used in the schools. We will table an official report once the audit is done,” answered the PS.
Education Ministry On The Spot As Questions Emerge Over Ksh.4.5B Spent On CBC Classes
