Sakaja calls on Senate to probe into NMS's Sh15 billion pending bills

For transparency and to lessen the burden of the county's pending bills, Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja wants the Senate to probe Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS) Sh15 billion pending bills.

The governor told the Senate Committee on Finance and Budget on Thursday that because NMS is a national government organisation, his administration cannot pay the Sh15.4 billion it left behind.

"The accounting officer of NMS is not the Nairobi County government. The best person to account for the pending bills is the NMS leadership," Sakaja said.

This was after it emerged that some garbage collection contractors had stopped working due to delayed payments by the county governments.

According to the governor, some of the contractors are among those whom NMS owed millions of shillings.

As a result, the Senate committee has directed Sakaja to furnish a written report within 14 days detailing NMS's outstanding bills and projects totalling 15.4 billion shillings.

Senators raised concerns over the apparent favouritism towards a select few companies in NMS tenders.

Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna criticised these tenders as dubious and called for an investigation into possible misappropriation of public funds.

Committee Chairman Ali Roba has directed Sakaja to submit comprehensive documentation regarding NMS transactions to verify the completion of work by the contracted companies and the legitimacy of payments due.

The governor has extended an invitation to the Auditor General's office to audit NMS operations and verify service delivery.

Furthermore, senators have requested additional information regarding pending projects and bills, and are considering summoning the executive office of the President to provide further clarifications.

In January, Sakaja said pending bills from the defunct Nairobi Metropolitan Services were to be moved to the Office of the President.

"What we agreed during the summit of the council of governors and the President was that all those pending NMS projects are domiciled under the executive order of the presidency, where NMS was domiciled," he said

There are about eight pending NMS projects which have not been completed.

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The county boss noted that the Office of the President will be the one to pay for and complete the projects.

NMS was retired President Uhuru Kenyatta's flagship project to upgrade the capital city after years of neglect by previous regimes.

Initiatives initiated by Uhuru under NMS, including health centres, water, sewer lines, and street lighting, have consumed billions.