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By Gatonye Gathura
Kenya: Kenya has been allocated more than Sh42.4 billion by the Global Fund for malaria, HIV and tuberculosis programmes for a three-year period.
But although not a pre-condition, the country will have to refund Sh270 million stolen from programmes financed by the fund in the period leading to 2010.
Last Thursday, the fund released a list showing how some $14.82 billion (KSh1.3 trillion) has been allocated among 123 countries for 2014-2016 period.
The allocations followed a board meeting held in Jakarta, Indonesia, early this month and will allow Kenya to access Sh28.9 billion for HIV, Sh9.7 billion for malaria and Sh3.8 billion for tuberculosis.
During the same meeting, the board had said it is determined to recover some Sh8.8 billion from 41 countries lost to theft, undocumented or ineligible spending in its first decade of operations.
Although the board does not name the guilty countries, a 2012 audit report had found Kenya to have lost about Sh270 million to theft and irregular spending.
The fund in 2012 had demanded that the monies be refunded in an arrangement which allows the guilty party continue working while repaying the lost funds.
Audit report
Responding to the audit report, the then Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Public Health and Sanitation Mark Bor, had said they had recovered the bulk of about Sh4.5 million withdrawn from a Global Fund grant using fake documents, with the staff members in question having been asked to pay back some Sh2.5 million.
But a Losses and Recoveries Report prepared for the Global Fund Board meeting in November in Geneva listed Kenya among countries which had not yet refunded all the stolen millions as demanded by the organisation.
In an earlier interview, John Ochero, the fund’s senior portfolio manager for Kenya, said the country had performed well since the previous audit.
“We are especially impressed by the country’s performance in HIV programmes, with scores ranging as high as A1. We don’t anticipate any serious divergence from the current trends, which means the country, may have no problems accessing funding.”
This will, however, be confirmed later in the year with Kenya being among 14 countries where the fund will be auditing its programmes in 2014. Others are Ecuador, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Honduras, Liberia, Myanmar, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and Ukraine.
Uganda has also been allocated $495 for the three diseases during the same period despite an earlier statement from the board regretting the signing of a tough anti-gay law.
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