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Kagwe moves 30 officers in battle against Afya House cartels


Can he succeed where his predecessors didn’t?

Can he tame the crooks and criminals who have called the shots at one of the country’s most important ministries for decades?

Those are some of the questions in the minds of many as Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe faces off with a cabal of well-connected and deeply rooted dissidents at Afya House, the ministry’s headquarters.

The genesis of the face-off, a Saturday Nation investigation shows, is a decision by the minister to seek the transfer of senior procurement and accounting officers, some of whom have worked at the ministry for more than 10 years, overseeing multibillion-shilling projects by one of the most well-funded dockets in government.

At least 30 officers have been moved from their plum Afya House offices, and more, according to ministry insiders, could be on the way out.

The Saturday Nation is not imputing wrongdoing on the transferred officers and does not have evidence yet of their criminal culpability.