Huge amounts of money is said to have exchanged hands between officers at the Wajir CountyAssembly and a supplier contracted to deliver security uniforms for askaris. Sources say that the entire tender process was flawed to ensure a specific company bagged it. The matter is now said to be under investigation as the allegation has also been captured in various audit reports.
According to well-placed sources, the county assembly paid Ksh. 1,920,000 for the provision of security uniforms. To show how cartels colluded to have the tender awarded to their preferred company, a purchase order was raised on the 15th of August, 2020 and was never approved nor authorized by the relevant officers.
Further, there is no evidence in form of S13, stores ledger and inspection and acceptance committee certificate to confirm if and when the uniforms were received. Shockingly, payment to the supplier was made on the 30th of July, 2020 while the quotations for the supply were opened on the 3rd of August, 2020 and evaluation was done on the 4th of August, 2020.
It is imperative to note that payment was made before the commencement of the procurement process. Investigating agencies must now move with speed to investigate circumstances under which Ksh. 1,920,000 was paid to a supplier before the commencement of the procurement process.
In this case, we suspect that the County Assembly did not obtain value for money incurred in the acquisition of security uniforms. The assembly also paid Ksh. 17m as legal fees to two law firms. Interestingly, the legal services were single-sourced as there is no evidence of competitive bidding from the list of prequalified legal firms.
The assembly leadership acted in contravention of Section 91(1) of the Public Procurement and Assets Disposal Act, 2015 which states that open tendering shall be the preferred procurement method for the procurement of goods, works and services.
