MPs order special audit of Nemis over suspected misallocation of education funds
As doubts over Nemis grow, MPs say the audit is necessary to safeguard public funds and ensure that no student is left behind due to data gaps.
The National Assembly has ordered a special audit of the National Education Management Information System (Nemis), citing flaws that may have led to the misallocation of billions of shillings in education funds.
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) wants the Auditor General to carry out a comprehensive inspection of the platform, which is responsible for managing student data used to distribute free primary and secondary school funds.
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The committee, led by Butere MP Tindi Mwale, raised concerns that some students were missing out on government capitation due to problems in the system.
Despite efforts by the Education Ministry to explain the shortcomings, PAC insisted on a deeper review.
MPs noted that Nemis has faced irregularities since its inception.
Although the system cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of shillings to develop and maintain, not all schools have been incorporated.
Some schools share identifier codes, raising fears that the platform could be used to siphon off public funds.
PAC said some of these codes are linked to non-existent schools that still received government funds.
“The committee recommends that the Auditor General conduct a systems audit report on Nemis,” it said in its report after reviewing the ministry’s 2022 accounts.
The issue of schools sharing bank accounts was also flagged during the committee’s investigation.
The legislatures questioned whether the funds for free day secondary education were being properly tracked, as the system allowed duplicate accounts at the time.
Officials from the ministry, including then Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang, admitted the system had failed to detect duplicate bank details but assured MPs that changes had since been made.
“The system has since been changed to ensure that no two accounts will be used to allocate funds to the same school,” Kipsang told the committee.
However, the committee still wants an independent audit to determine whether these loopholes have been fully sealed.
There were also inconsistencies in how schools were registered on the platform.
Auditors found that over 3,480 schools were listed using codes from the Teachers Service Commission (TSC), even though the TSC only manages teachers, not institutions.
PAC has directed that all schools be fully integrated into Nemis within three months. It also instructed the new accounting officer, Julius Bitok, to ensure every school has a unique identifier code.
Auditor-General Nancy Gathungu raised further questions about the ownership and management of the system.
According to her report, the Education Ministry could not provide any copyright or registration documents showing it legally owns Nemis.
Gathungu also found that the ministry had no clear records identifying which officials were responsible for different parts of the system’s development and maintenance.
There were no documents outlining the roles of the teams involved or detailing the platform’s functionality, security measures, or how it protects users' data.
These concerns led her to question the Sh239 million recently spent on upgrading the platform.
Although a new server was installed, the government could not produce handover documents or technical manuals.
“Value for money may not have been realised in the Sh239 million expenditure on the re-engineering of Nemis,” Gathungu stated.
She said the government was unable to prove whether past system weaknesses had been addressed or if the platform could scale to meet future needs.
Teachers have also voiced frustration, claiming there has been interference in the platform’s operations by the ministry. Their demands for an investigation have added to the pressure for accountability.
As doubts over Nemis grow, MPs say the audit is necessary to safeguard public funds and ensure that no student is left behind due to data gaps.
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