CONTROLLER of Budget Agnes Odhiambo and her deputy Stephen Masha have landed in trouble with President Uhuru Kenyatta over perceived close links with opposition chief Raila Odinga.
The Star has established that the two – who must authorise any withdrawal from the public coffers – were recently summoned to State House after Raila admitted on national TV he had discussed details of the Sh250 billion Eurobond cash with the CoB.
Sources said an angry President Kenyatta accused the office of arming the opposition with adverse propaganda artillery to bring down his administration.
In an interview on Citizen TV on December 21, Raila said Odhiambo had confided in him that over $1 billion from the Eurobond proceeds was not pumped into the Kenyan economy.
“I talked to her before I even went public and she told me a different story . . . she is under a lot of pressure and I actually sympathise with her. She is being intimidated and blackmailed to change that story,” Raila said.
Raila was later to name the Controller of Budget as among “persons of interest” together with a host of high profile civil servants in the Eurobond saga, which he has termed the “grand robbery of Kenya”.
It remains unclear what exactly transpired at State House, apart from the reading of the riot act.
However, Odhiambo was admitted in hospital for weeks last month, for what sources linked to pressure in the delivery of her mandate.
The CoB landed the plum job after Raila vehemently opposed the nomination of William Kirwa by ex-President Mwai Kibaki in 2011.
Currently, the office has yet to release its 2015/2016 second-quarter budget implementation review report that has often put both the county and national governments on the spot over expenditure.
The report was to be released by December 31.
The Star has also established that National Treasury Cabinet Secretary Henry Rotich has an increasingly strained relationship with Auditor General Edward Ouko.
Reliable sources indicate that Rotich opposed the installation
of software that would allow the audit office to track transactions in the controversial government electronic transaction system IFMIS.
IFMIS was later to become a conduit for looting taxpayers’ money at the National Youth Service, resulting in the resignation under massive external pressure of former Devolution Cabinet Secretary Anne Waiguru.
Waiguru denied any wrongdoing.
The ruling Jubilee’s disapproval of Ouko and Odhiambo became public late last year, when MPs led by Majority leader Aden Duale accused the two of sabotaging the government.
-the-star.co.ke
