A man died at the airport. The committee he chaired was itself convened to rubber-stamp a decision already made. The firm it was evaluating had bribed its way through Liberia, bilked Ghana for over a decade and been thrown out by the very government that spawned it. None of this gave Nairobi County pause.
For a governor who spent three years loudly proclaiming that Nairobi would never again be run from State House, Tuesday’s signing ceremony represented a politically jarring reversal.
The 20-year tenure means the contract will outlast at least three gubernatorial terms, binding future county governments to a deal whose terms remain largely opaque to the public.
Official records show that unpaid revenues ballooned by a staggering Sh2 billion between July and September last year, with land rates defaulters alone accounting for Sh1.29 billion of the unpaid dues. Only 50,000 out of 250,000 registered land parcels currently pay rates, exposing a catastrophic failure in revenue collection.
The reshuffle extends far beyond Mosiria, affecting ten senior county chief officers in what appears to be a wholesale reorganization of Sakaja’s inner circle.
The timing and circumstances surrounding these payments have raised eyebrows within City Hall, particularly given that all privately contracted garbage collectors under Sakaja’s administration have downed tools due to outstanding arrears exceeding Sh600 million.
Having come into office promising transparency and fiscal responsibility, the unexplained removal of nearly Sh40 billion from the county’s books without proper documentation raises serious questions about financial governance under his leadership.
The hiring binge began almost immediately after Sakaja took office in September 2022, with staff numbers jumping to 13,355 by June 2023 in his first full financial year.
Letters to Governor Sakaja seeking system access have reportedly gone unanswered, further fueling suspicions about the county’s financial operations.
Court documents filed by Rachier and Amollo Advocates detail how county officials forcibly entered the premises on May 14, demolished a gate, and posted a notice claiming ownership over unpaid rates.
“We are told Freemasonry is a secret society, it is not,” he stated. “Freemasonry is purely an organization where we try to make good men better men.”
In explosive testimony before the Nairobi County Assembly, several women described a predatory system where officers routinely demand sexual favors in exchange for allowing them to operate their businesses without interference.
County officials started marking non-compliant buildings on Monday before deploying enforcement teams across the city at 8 am Tuesday.
