Kiraitu Murungi suspends top Meru County staff in readiness for audit

Kiraitu Murungi took over as the governor of Meru County on August 18. He has called for a thorough audit of the county resources. Photo: Darlington Manyara, Standard

Meru Governor Kiraitu Murungi has sent on indefinite leave all top officials to pave way for a human resource and financial audit.

Those targeted by Kiraitu are the acting County Secretary James Mutia, 10 County Executive Committee Members otherwise called CECMs and all departmental Chief Officers (CO) who are equivalent of the Principal Secretaries in the national government.

Also to take leave are four heads of autonomous agencies created by former Governor Peter Munya's administration namely the Meru County Development and Investment Corporation (MCIDC), Meru Revenue Board, Liquor Licensing Board and Meru Microfinance Corporation.

Kiraitu who spoke after meeting church leaders said an audit of all casual workers was being undertaken because the system had been abused and many ghost workers and idle capacity was straining the county resources.

"We have formally requested the Office of the Auditor General to carry out the financial audit and they are ready to begin immediately," he said.

"We have also requested the Public Service Board to carry out urgent human resource audit to establish the actual number of employees including those employed on permanent, contractual and causal terms against the ones in the current payroll.”

Kiraitu, who vied on Jubilee Party ticket, won the election with 281,737 votes against former governor Munya of PNU who garnered 232 569 votes.