Kitui Governor Julius Malombe and his team have explained why the County has over 390 bank accounts.
They appeared before the Senate Devolution and Intergovernmental Relations Committee to discuss Kitui County’s commercial bank accounts.
Malombe attributed the many accounts to the high number of health facilities in the County. Each health facility has their own account.
“The reason why we have many health facility accounts is because Kitui has the highest number of health facilities in the republic of Kenya. We have 308 facilities, if you tabulate the other 47 counties don’t have as much. We have to have an account per facility, per TVET. Kitui is large in terms of area and has a sizeable population and that party informs the many accounts.” Malombe said.
“We have 20 accounts at Central Bank of Kenya, we have CRF account, Development account, a Reccurent account, and then the other 16 are program accounts, I can narrate some but a few of the programs have ended we just need to close them.” They added.
Malombe also insisted that there should be a discussion between the council of governors, the controller of the budget, and the auditor general to align the issue of bank accounts held by counties.
The committee expressed concerns that it was not practically possible for counties to have less than 10 accounts as they have to maintain accounts for TVETs and Health facilities.
The issue of the bank accounts was among the issues raised in the 2022/2023 Audit Report for Kitui County. Missed the story? check it out below;