The County Public Accounts Committee has directed Uasin Gishu Jonathan Bii to submit a schedule detailing how the County spent Sh654 million of the revenue it received in the 2022/23 financial year.

The receipts of the revenue accounts indicate that the County received Sh9.3 billion during the financial year. However, the Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS) indicate that the county’s transactions totaled Sh9.9 billion, translating to a disparity of the Sh654 million.

The Committee, which is chaired by Senator Moses Kajwang’, issued the order after the Governor failed to explain the huge disparity between the two entries.

In its responses to audit queries, the county government did not submit a reconciliation statement to indicate how the money was spent.

“You need to provide a schedule detailing how the Sh654 million was spent,” Senator Kajwang directed when the Governor appeared before the Committee to respond to queries raised by the Auditor General for the 2022/23 financial year.

“Failure to do so, we shall leave this committee with no option but to conclude that the funds have been stolen.”

The Governor defended himself from the anomaly telling the Committee that query was a carry over from the period when he was not in office.

The period he stated was from the 2019/20 financial year.

He told the Committee that his administration has carried a reconciliation of all historical debts which will be captured in the report of the financial statements for the 2024/25 financial year.

However, Senator Edwin Sifuna and Senator Fatuma Dulllo rejected the explanation from the County, reminding the Governor that governments exist in perpetuity.

“You are the Governor and you can’t us about you not being in office,” said Senator Sifuna.

The Governor was also hard pressed how his administration paid a law firm Sh6.2 million for representing the County in a mediation process whose total value was Sh40 million.

The Committee was further appalled after it emerged that the matter had been conducted virtually, through an online platform that did not allow parties to meet.

Under the Advocates Remuneration Order, an advocate is entitled to charge an instruction fee which is based on the value of the subject matter, a fee for getting up and preparing for trial which is one quarter of the instruction fees, a fee for preparing court documents which is chargeable per page, a fee for perusing correspondence.