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Most county govt employees are blood relatives


A total of 2,500 workers at City Hall are blood relatives, it can be revealed today.

With a total of around 11,000 workers, this means about 23 per cent of the total work force is related.

Up to four members of the same family are working in different departments, according to a new staff audit.

They all benefit from a culture of nepotism that was deeply ingrained in the defunct City Council when it was still under the former Ministry of Local Government.  Mayors, councillors and even former town clerks perfected the family affair by dishing out jobs without advertising, the report concludes.  Even some former ministers of Local Government are stained by nepotism, the report concludes.

Governor Evans Kidero told NairobiNews he could not sack workers on the ground they were related — but he would ensure the situation would not recur.

“Doing so could violate labour laws,” he said. “What we can do, however, is to seal all loopholes so that future recruitment is guided by the policy of meritocracy.”

He said the jobs audit was meant to establish the suitability of employees and see what could be done to change the system.

“The intention was to rationalise and match competencies of employees in the county government to positions available,” Dr Kidero explained.

And he added: “Some of the findings are so shocking and have given us answers to why City Hall is forever crawling when it should self-sufficient.”

The head count also found out that out of 11,048 employees, 562 were aged above 57 while 3,457 were above 50.

Most of the non-existent ghost workers had multiple entries on the payroll, with some appearing up to five times using the same names but different identity card numbers.

The report also indicated that 8000 employees come from the same region.

There were also a large number of retired or dead employees still on the payroll and who continue to draw monthly salaries. Some staff were found to be living abroad.

There were around 2,000 ghost workers still being paid, the survey found.

The Ministry of Health submitted a staff payroll of 4, 229 workers while only 2,056 could be accounted for, according to the report published last month and confidentially handed to Dr Kidero.

About 150 workers were on duty outside Nairobi or on leave.

Several workers in other counties were found to have cheated their way onto the Nairobi payroll in a bid to get hefty housing and travel allowances not enjoyed by those working outside Nairobi.

“A number of them, for example, work in Kisumu but are on the city’s payroll,” noted the report.

Nairobi County Health Executive Dr Timothy King’ondu admitted the existence of fake workers but blamed the ministry for the mess.

“This was a calculated move to earn hefty allowances by people who are not employees or are employees in other counties. This is graft,” said Mr King’ondu.