WHO suspends funding Afya House activities

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has suspended funding to the Ministry of Health after delays in accounting for Sh11.2 million sent to counties.

Afya House says it disbursed money to all the 47 counties for Guinea worm advocacy support and surveillance between January and March this year but the counties are yet to account for it.

Director of Medical Services Jackson Kioko wrote to the Council of Governors (CoG) last week, giving counties two days to furnish the ministry with expenditure returns to enable the unfreezing of the kitty.

“Today, very few counties have submitted expenditure returns for the funds they received and only 20 counties have submitted activity reports,” Kioko said.

“Subsequently, WHO has suspended further disbursement of funds for ministry of Health’s planned activities,” Dr. Kioko said.

He however did not disclose the total amount of funds affected.

In the letter dated May 29, 2017, Afya House said the money was disbursed in December 2016 through the county directors of health.

“This is to bring to your attention the urgency of this matter and the need for expeditious action on your part by May 31, 2017,” the letter to CoG chairman Josphat Nanok reads.

Yesterday, the council said it had not responded to the letter as it was not aware the money had been disbursed in the first case.

“We are yet to respond as we are checking with individual counties to ascertain if they received such monies. However, from that letter it’s clear the money did not pass through the county revenue accounts but was sent to individual accounts of directors of health,” CoG chief executive officer Jacqueline Mogeni said.

Kioko’s letter came as the Ministry of Health extended its internal systems audit to counties days after the US government cut aid to the health docket over lack of accountability.

Afya House said it had dispatched 15 internal auditors to 32 counties to access internal controls put in place to ensure effective utilisation of public resources.

Last month, Dr Kioko wrote to former CoG chairman Peter Munya explaining that mission.

“The purpose of this letter is to inform you of the activity and request that your officers in the selected facilities cooperate fully with the team and provide relevant documents that auditors will require as they undertake the systems review,” the letter dated May 15, 2017 reads.

Counties have already raised concerns over the nature of audit arguing the national government did not have a supervisory mandate and thus couldn’t send internal auditors.

The CoG insisted that counties were independent, with internal audit systems, and only the Kenya National Audit Office (Kenao) led by the Auditor General had overall powers to audit both level of governments.

The development also came days after counties demanded a bigger say in how the Sh350 billion grant from the Global Fund would be used.