Audit and expose Sh2bn maize scam cartel, say leaders
Trucks loaded with maize outside the National Cereals and Produce Board in Industrial Area, Nakuru. PHOTO | FILE | NATION MEDIA GROUP
What you need to know:
- Moiben MP Silas Tiren and his Nandi Hills counterpart Alfred Keter, said many farmers were grappling with financial problems.
- Mr Keter said influential individuals have been importing maize and supplying it to NCPB at the expense of genuine farmers.
- Baringo Senator Gideon Moi has appealed to President Uhuru Kenyatta to ensure those behind the maize scandal are brought to book.
- Mr Tiren wondered why former NCPB Managing Director Newton Terer resigned on a Sunday, a day government offices are usually closed.
Leaders from the North Rift are now demanding an independent audit to establish all maize deliveries made to National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB) depots countrywide.
They also want the audit to reveal the names of those who made the deliveries.
The leaders, among them Moiben MP Silas Tiren and his Nandi Hills counterpart Alfred Keter, said many farmers were grappling with financial problems, with some who delivered their maize as early as December yet to be paid.
“We need an independent audit to unearth all these mysteries. Farmers have no other source of income. I wonder why we are destroying the lives of these people,” said Mr Tiren.
The farmers are demanding close to Sh4 billion for produce delivered to NCPB stores, even as the country is yet to come to terms with the Sh2 billion maize scandal that has put top government officials on the spot.
INFLUENTIAL INDIVIDUALS
Mr Keter said influential individuals have been importing maize and supplying it to NCPB at the expense of genuine farmers. “We should be given the names of those who filled NCPB depots with maize. Many farmers cannot cater for their families,” said Mr Keter.
At the same time, Baringo Senator Gideon Moi has appealed to President Uhuru Kenyatta to ensure those behind the maize scandal are brought to book.
“Farmers should not suffer because of cartels that benefited from unscrupulous deals. Corrupt individuals are threatening to derail President Kenyatta’s Big Four Agenda,” he said.
He said the government, through Agricultural Finance Corporation, should also consider extending the grace period for genuine farmers who took loans and are servicing them, until NCPB and the National Treasury process the payments.
Mr Tiren wondered why former NCPB Managing Director Newton Terer resigned on a Sunday, a day government offices are usually closed.
“Who received his resignation notice? Why hasn’t the government been quick to investigate the NCPB scam, like it did with the NYS one? Many things do not add up in this maize mess,” said Mr Tiren.
FAILED BETTING
It has also emerged that 13 people who supplied huge quantities of maize to NCPB had failed in the vetting, but still were paid at least Sh1 billion.
This is according to a report by the head of internal audit at the Ministry of Agriculture, Mr Moses Karanja, that principal secretary Richard Lesiyampe presented to the National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee.
According to the audit, the amount was paid to individuals who supplied maize in Eldoret and Kisumu depots, yet they failed in vetting conducted at location level. The vetting was done by chiefs and agriculture officers.
Sources told the Nation that those who supplied the produce and got paid were traders who took advantage of the situation to buy maize from farmers at low prices, compared with the high premiums offered by the government.
EASE DELIVERY OF MAIZE
Cereal farmers have called for the setting up of buying centres to ease delivery of maize. “Silos have become a cartel paradise. It is where they lay and hatch their eggs,” said Uasin Gishu Governor Jackson Mandago.
The farmers have also petitioned the government to hand over NCPB roles to county governments after the agriculture department was transferred to devolved units. They said decentralisation of NCPB would safeguard it from mismanagement.
Anti-graft body-Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) has since commenced investigation on powerful individuals behind the maize scandal.
Detectives have pitched camp at various NCPB depots in Western Kenya where cheap crop suspected to be from Uganda and Mexico was delivered and prompt payment made at the expense of genuine farmers.
