Ex-radio queen Angela Angwenyi’s posh house faces auction after NYS probe
Former radio presenter Angela Angwenyi has lost her house to auctioneers who are set to sell the apartment at Jacaranda Gardens estate in Nairobi after she ran into financial difficulties.
Monday, Garam Auctioneers placed a newspaper advertisement announcing that the apartment was up for auction.
“Our subject property is part of Jacaranda estate along Kamiti Road just after the Northern bypass,” the notice read.
Ms Angwenyi has run into financial headwinds after she was embroiled in the National Youth Service scandal where Out of the Box Solutions Limited, a firm associated with her, won a Sh302 million consultancy contract to publicise tenders for women and the youth.
The contract for user support services and sensitisation campaigns did not specify the obligations for the parties, raising doubts on whether advertisements actually ran as stipulated in the contract.
CAMPAIGN
Out of the Box Solutions Limited was awarded the contract to carry out a campaign to enhance access to the 30 percent of government tenders reserved for women, the youth and people living with disabilities.
The National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) stopped payments to the firm owned by Ms Angwenyi and Antony Lungaho after they had been paid Sh90.7 million.
Dozens of government officials and business people have appeared in court in recent months on charges related to alleged theft of hundreds of millions of shillings from public coffers,including at the NYS.
Although both Ms Angwenyi and Mr Lungaho appeared before Parliament to answer querries, neither has been charged in court in connection with the NYS case.
Many of those linked to the scandal are having a difficult time adjusting their lives after some lost their business incomes while others were hounded out of office, their bank accounts frozen and assets seized.
HIGH-PROFILE
Among those embroilled in a high-profile case arising from the scandal are former Youth Affairs and Gender principal secretary Lillian Omollo whose seven bank accounts with Sh20.6 million were frozen as were those of her children — Sheela Mbogo, Stephanie Mbogo and Shalom Kamwetu — which had Sh12.5 million.
Ms Omollo made an application early this year urging court to allow her withdraw Sh6.8 million to pay fees, wages for domestic workers, electricity, water, Wi-Fi connection, telephone, DStv and security.
The court allowed her to withdraw Sh2 million to cater for living expenses but the account remains frozen.
The rise in prosecutions of graft related cases has led to the recovery of assets worth Sh3.8 billion in the year to June 2018, up from Sh300 million a year earlier — reflecting the government’s aggression in recovering stolen public properties. This has prompted the National Treasury to push to use the funds to finance the country’s budget.
The Treasury published draft guidelines on how proceeds of crimes, money laundering and corruption should be allocated for public benefit with investments in government securities.
This story was first published in the Business Day.