Nairobi — The Parliamentary watchdog committee has demanded a special audit on the expenditure of Sh4.5 billion used for the construction of phase 2 of the Competency-Based Curriculum classrooms.
National Assembly Public Accounts Committee has raised queries on the criteria used to establish contractors and whether there was value for money following revelations that community members were involved in choosing contractors.
Basic Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang told the committee that a multi-agency team alongside community members was involved in choosing contractors that were involved in the project.
"I have to indicate that this was done through a multi-agency, and we will provide evidence of those who registered and how the information was taken down to the chief's office. The persons we targeted out of necessity were contractors, and those are the ones we communicated to," Kipsang stated.
Members of Parliament have however poked holes on the claims pushing for the Ministry of Education to adduce evidence on how the community was involved in choosing the contractors awarded the tenders to build the classrooms.
Funyula MP Oundo Mudenyo complained that no public participation was undertaken prior to and during the construction of the classrooms saying only county education officials were involved in the procurement process.
"There was no community participation, the process was undertaken by the Director County Education, how can you say there was community participation and yet MPs who represent the people never knew?" posed Mudenyo.
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Rarieda MP Otiende Amollo questioned the criteria for public participation in the construction of the classrooms if MPs were not aware of the construction in their constituencies.
"I have no idea who the contractors were in Rarieda constituency, I have no idea how they were procured, so we need to be convinced by evidence on how the community was involved in determining the contractors," said Omollo.
Lugari MP Nabii Nabwera expressed he was aware of the construction in his constituency but however, poked holes on the quality of the classrooms saying it was a rip-off to the taxpayers.
"When you are homeless, and you are being rained on, you can take shelter under a tree that will not mean that the tree is habitable, that is what happened in my Lugari constituency, and all the classes were poorly done," Nabwera stated.
The government embarked on the construction of 3, 500 additional classes for the Competency Based Curriculum across the country which were completed in August last year.
This follows the successful completion of phase one of the project where a total of 6,500 classrooms were constructed.
