121 Machakos staff hold fake academic papers – official

121 out of 5, 018 Machakos County Government employees’ academic certificates recently exposed to verifications by the Kenya National Examination Council (Knec) are fake, County Secretary Muya Ndambuki has disclosed.

Muya said Knec made the revelation following a request made by the county government’s executive’s request for authentication of the staffers’ copies of academic certificates in February 2024.

“We must ensure that our public servants are of such a calibre as to give nothing short of the best to the people of Machakos,” Ndambuki said.

Ndambuki addressed the press at his office in Machakos town on Monday.

“There is every indication that this number may go up due to cases under investigations by the same body on the anomalies such as name mismatch. These are persons don’t deserve to be in the public service in the first place,” Ndambuki said.

He said the suspects had unduly bled the county resources that ought to have benefited the people of Machakos.

“I direct the Chief Officer of Public Service to initiate the process of exiting these persons from the public service and institute recovery of any earnings by these persons as provided by the law within two days,” Ndambuki said.

Ndambuki said they were in contact with individual universities and the Kenya National Qualification Authority to verify degrees and diplomas.

“I dare say that the same process will be repeated. A time has come to cleanse the public service of evil. This will be done objectively, fairly but very firmly and in a focused manner going forward. No stone will be left unturned to ensure that we sanitise the public service,” Ndambuki said.

Ndambuki said they had also interdicted 14 officers working for the devolved unit’s revenue department for allegedly engaging in corruption.

“In the last few days, it has been reported that officers in various stations are derailing and sabotaging revenue collection by various acts of omission or commission,” Ndambuki said.

He said the activities included issuing fake documents such as permits, receipts and stickers, and cash collections instead of depositing money into the county government’s official pay bill.

“Colluding to deliberately undercharge payments and collusion to evade payments all together,” Ndambuki said.

Ndambuki said all the fourteen employees were from the Masii ward in the Mwala subcounty where cases of malpractices relating to revenue collection had been observed and reported.

“In response to this, I wish to report that we have interdicted 14 officers who in one way or another alleged to have taken part in this scheme to defraud the county of revenue. These employees vacate their offices until they are cleared of these allegations or otherwise,” Ndambuki said.

He said the interdictions had been immediately effected.

Ndambuki said the cases had been picked by EACC who had already instigated investigated investigations on the same.

“We are holding no prisoners as far as this matter is concerned. It can’t be business as usual when it comes to embezzlement or denying the county government of revenue,” he said.