Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna and Vihiga Senator Godfrey Osotsi have been removed from the Senate Public Accounts Committee.

🇰🇪 Breaking It Down

The removal on July 29 will see Sifuna move from the County Public Accounts Committee (CPAC) to the Standing Committee on Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries.

His Vihiga counterpart now moves from the County Public Investments and Special Funds Committee (CPISFC) to the Standing Committee on National Cohesion, Equal Opportunity and Regional Integration. Senator Sifuna has been replaced by Kilifi Senator Stewart Madzayo, and Senator Joseph Githuku has been nominated to the committee chaired by Senator Moses Kajwang'.

Osotsi has likewise been replaced by Taita Taveta Senator Johnes Mwaruma, and the nominated Senator is Hezena Lemaletian.

📌 What You Need to Know

Their removal from their respective committees is reported to have been initiated by the Board-Based Coalition Senators from the Minority, who are largely from the Orange Democratic Movement.

This follows their active involvement in the Linda Mwananchi movement, an opposition faction within ODM that fiercely challenges the political direction of the current party leadership and objects to working alongside the Kenya Kwanza administration.

CPAC and CPISFC rank among the Senate's most powerful oversight organs, exercising direct control over how counties spend billions of taxpayer dollars annually.

Both committees scrutinise reports from the Office of the Auditor-General, examining how national revenue allocations and locally generated funds are spent.

This means that sitting governors must physically appear before them to explain irregular expenditures, pending bills, and stalled development projects across their counties.

Where defiance persists, the committees can recommend that the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) and the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) investigate suspected graft or advise the Treasury to freeze disbursements at the county level entirely.

📰 Source: Kenyans.co.ke