Chief of Staff and Head of Public Service, Felix Koskei, has urged Parliament to work on laws that will seal loopholes used by unscrupulous public servants to evade scrutiny by parliamentary committees.
“Incidences of ignoring Parliamentary summons should be treated as a breach of the Constitution and should therefore attract the appropriate sanctions within the legal parameters,” he said today in Mombasa.
He was speaking during a consultative meeting between members of six parliamentary audit committees and the Executive Office of the President which took place at a Mombasa hotel.
“This inaction if not checked, is likely to spiral into a common practice, and indeed, in some sectors, this has already happened, perpetuating a culture of waste and mismanagement,” said Mr. Koskei.
The meeting is part of the government’s “Zero-Fault Audit” campaign for the FY2023/2024, which is aimed at achieving zero-fault audit queries by applying the highest accounting and auditing standards in public finance management.
Mr. Koskei said principal secretaries and accounting officers have been fully appraised on the government’s commitment to zero-fault audits and resolving audit queries.
“Henceforth, accounting officers should appear before you fully prepared and the perennial excuses of lack of documentation witnessed historically should not be tolerated,” he said.
Mr. Koskei reiterated President William Ruto’s commitment to fighting corruption and that no one will be allowed to jeopardize service delivery by pilfering tax payers money.
“It’s upon public servants and all those in the network of corruption, to chose the options given by the President, and which are in the public domain,” he said.
Some of the committee chairs in attendance include David Pkosing (Commercial Affairs and Energy), Tindi Mwale (Vice Chair, Public Accounts Committee), and Caleb Hamisi (Vice Chair, Social Services, Administration and Agriculture).
Also in attendance at the meeting were officials from the Auditor General’s office, National Treasury, and the Controller of Budget.
