Kisumu City Manager warns corrupt officials, threaten to arrest them.

 Kisumu City Manager Dorris Ombara at her office at City Hall.She has put the corrupt officials working there on notice-Photo By Dickson Odhiambo.

By Dickson Odhiambo.

April 5, 2018.

Kisumu City Manager warns corrupt officials, threaten to arrest them.

ALL Corrupt officials working under the Management of City of Kisumu will not be entertained at all cost, Kisumu City Manager has said.

Kisumu City Manager Dorris Ombara says the rate of corruption perpetuated by some officials working in the different departments within the City Management is very worrying and must be tamed.

Speaking during an exclusive interview with this writer, Ombara said there are some cartels working within the city management who are out to frustrate her effort as the city Manager especially on her stand to fight corruption.

Ombara says some of the officers working under her are to blame for the mushrooming of illegal containers in a number of places within the city where they are not needed since they collude and take bribes from those who want their containers to be in such places.

“Some of my officials here are largely to blame for the mushrooming of illegal structures within the City and I must come out and say that these are the cartels that are out to frustrate my work because of my stand to fight corruption here. They are now the ones who peddle lies that I have been embezzling funds and this is not true,” Ombara says.

Ombara says some officers take money from the public to put up such illegal containers and structures, adding that there is a case she is currently handling where one of her officers took shs 160,000 to allow someone put a container at a place which is not the right place.

“These same officers are the ones who are engaged in the mushrooming of the illegal containers because they take money from the public and there is a case in point where an officer here took shs 160,000 from a certain businessman so as to help her put up a container and this did not go through. 

The person has reported such a case to me while claiming that the officer want him pay another shs 160,000 and I am following it up. This is unacceptable and better this be stopped forthwith,” she adds.

She says she has transferred some staffs who have been engaged in some corrupt activities which have made the City Management to lose public funds, adding that some of the officers even ended up forging her signature to engage in corrupt activities.

“Some of these officers have even ended up forging my signature but when I took up this matter to the previous County Government, nothing was done. I am not able to work with such a cartel,” Ombara says.

She adds that those who have been found to have engaged in corrupt activities will bear the responsibility, adding that a lot needs to be done in order to tame corruption.

“I have even discovered that some officers have engaged in purchasing a tonner for printer at shs 24,000 instead of shs 6,000 which is the actual price. I cannot allow such things to happen here under my watch as the city manager,” she says.

She says that such corrupt officials have now turned to revenge by spreading propaganda that she takes bribes from contractors to give them work to do, adding that those who are accusing her should provide proof and  invite the Ethics and Anti-Corruption commission to investigate her.

“I am taking these files for the cartels that have been engaged in corrupt activities here to the Governor and the procurement and will forward the same to EACC for investigations,” Ombara adds.

Ombara has threatened to arrest the culprits so as to face charges related to corruption, adding that she will sue those who have engaged in defaming her while claiming that she is corrupt.

Ombara now says that it is high time the Kisumu City Management Board to be in place, adding that the Board will be able to help her vet all the employees and get their suitability.

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