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Sonko: I did my best to expose graft but agencies let me down


Nairobi governorship candidate Mike Sonko has defended his tenure as the city’s senator, projecting himself as a legislator who did a lot to oversee the county, but was let down by State agencies involved in the war against corruption.

The Jubilee candidate defended his performance on Wednesday, saying he had done his best to expose corruption at the Nairobi County Government but the anti-corruption authorities and the public prosecutor failed to act on his reports.

NOTHING DONE

“I did my investigations on what was going on and passed all the information I gathered to the investigators but nothing has been done,” he said at a news conference when he launched a report on what he terms key problems facing the city.

He was accompanied by his running mate, Mr Polycarp Igathe, who pledged to ensure service delivery and a clean Nairobi.

He claimed that he had repossessed land grabbed by powerful cartels at City Hall to the tune of Sh27 billion and reverted it to the owners.

Some of the land he claimed to have recovered were parcels belonging to the PCEA Church in Karen and Ngara markets and Kamukunji Secondary, Lang’ata High and Lavington Primary schools.

The senator spoke on Wednesday when he launched a report titled: The Problems of Nairobi County: Chronicle of Mismanaged City.

EXPOSING ROT

The report, prepared by his team with the aim of exposing the rot in the city under the Kidero administration, also provides the roadmap for Mr Sonko’s manifesto which will be launched next week.

It deals with irregular and illegal human resources practices, reckless management of public land and the never-ending stink of garbage based on the findings of controller of budget, the auditor-general and other officials reports.

During the TV debate of the Nairobi governorship candidates on Monday, independent candidate Peter Kenneth singled out the senator, saying he had failed to provide the necessary oversight to ensure the county’s funds were not misused.

Mr Igathe, who led the process of gathering information on the report, said the county’s assets were poorly handled and that Nairobi had no fixed assets register which made it vulnerable to theft and loss to grabbers.

REVIEW ALL CONTRACTS

Mr Igathe promised to review all contracts entered into by the Kidero administration that are illegal.

One of the contracts the team promised to review is the county government’s electronic revenue system which they say is “extortionist” and was irregularly acquired as it is neither accountable nor verifiable and is prone to manipulation.

“By opting for JamboPay, the county government will incur an extra cost of Sh767.5 million over the five- year contract period.