Ghosts of State House are alive and well, let's rebuild from bottom up

State House, Nairobi. [File, Standard]

An audit by the Public Service Commission spotlights the State House as one of the government institutions riven with most ghost workers. Apparently, there are nearly 500 individuals who regularly pocket salaries, even though there is no record of their employment, or work done.

As one of the most guarded establishments on this side of the world, it’s difficult to comprehend how faceless goons climb over the State House fence and queue up at the Cash Office with their forged staff badges and take off with the loot.

But since this is Kenya and Kenya is our business, everything lies in the realm of the possible. And the longer one considers such a possibility, the more plausible it seems that such heists are possible.

First off, Prezzo Bill Ruto has barely been in State House, opting to spend most of his days abroad in his quest for job-hunts for Kenyans. When the house owner is away, bad things happen.

One might be tempted to question the wisdom of Prezzo Ruto’s forays abroad, when more practical solutions can be found at home. I mean, what would be the point of reinventing the wheel: if some charlatans can create ghost work and earn real cash, why not replicate the magic around the 47 counties, and magnify manifold?

Another window that could have been exploited by those ghost workers could be the abundance of funds at State House. After all, aren’t all public entities guided by budgetary limitations?

Now, it seems to me, that the State House Nairobi is awash with cash. I’m not sure what legal proviso would be used to avail extra cash, but I suspect that’s what they call “budgeted graft.” That means money set aside for the singular purpose of stealing it.

At the last check, before the Controller of Budget Margaret Nyakang’o, was hauled off to Mombasa overnight and overland, she revealed she had found excess cash in unlikely accounts.

Talking of financial accounts, I understand the government has introduced a singular bank account to store all its monies, apparently because some clever Johnnies have been depositing our cash in interest-earning accounts. They pocket the interests and surrender our cash, when it’s not stolen and stashed under the bed by hairdressers.

However, I am not persuaded, even for a moment, that such measures will deal with the unique phenomenon of ghost workers at State House. Now that some folks in Kenya Kwanza have been considering talking to former Prezzo Uhuru Kenyatta, I think they should go even further and listen to recordings from good old Jomo.

I understand Jomo never stayed at State House, Nairobi, opting instead to commute daily to his home in Ichaweri. Jomo said he couldn’t sleep in the same house where the former colonial governors used to call home. The wazungu spirits just couldn’t give Jomo rest.

I have always wondered if Jomo saw photos fall off their frames, heard doors bang in the dead of night, or saw hairline cracks emerge when lightning cut through the skies. Or if he heard Cockney-speaking ghosts mock him in his dreams.

All we know now is that such ghosts are real, and that they have a ravenous appetite for our cash. To exorcise the space, what’s needed is more radical than the proposed renovations over the coming months.

How about dismantling the building to the ground to inaugurate an affordable housing project from its ruins? Now, that’s what people-driven revolution would look like. It would bring the so-called mama mboga and boda boda man uptown and affirm that the Bottom-Up Transformative Agenda isn’t just a pack of hot-air.