TSC Boss Nancy Macharia On The Spot Over Missing Sh466M From Teachers Payroll

Members of the National Assembly are now demanding a forensic audit on the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) payroll system amid rising expenditure attributed to salary overpayments.

The bid to audit the public service teacher employer gained momentum on Tuesday after the House Public Accounts Committee (PAC) grilled TSC CEO Nancy Macharia over a Sh466 million sum flagged by the Auditor General under the Financial Year 2021/2022.

Macharia explained that the overpayments had grown over the years due to an inefficient reporting system which she said remained manual.

“Salary overpayment occurred as a result of the delay in stoppage of salary of employees upon death, desertion of duty, resignation, transfer of services, sick leave, interdiction, and absenteeism,” said Macharia.

In FY2020/2021, TSC reported spending Sh352 million on salaries out of which Sh114 resulted from overpayment.

Unwillingness to recover funds

Auditor General Nancy Gathungu pointed out that TSC had failed to demonstrate efforts to recover salary overpayments signaling unwillingness to recover the funds.

MPs raised concerns on why the state commission has failed in two subsequent years to address overpayments questioning whether TSC officials were colluding to steal from the public coffers.

“If we feel there’s a problem with TSC payroll system, nothing stops us from calling for a forensic audit to understand it and call for a review,” said Mbadi.

Funyula MP Oundo Mudenyo insisted on an in-depth review of the TSC payroll system to iron out the systemic challenges that have led to the loss of public funds.

“There seems to be a lot of challenges. In my constituency, some teachers don’t go to school a whole year and are paid in full,” Mudenyo said.

TSC CEO told the agitated MPs the commission has developed an overpayment policy and online service to improve efficiency with respect to death, resignation, desertion of duty as well as absenteeism to facilitate payroll cleanup.

Soy MP David Kiplagat expressed his reservations saying the state commission must adopt a digitized system to seal the gaps that have led to salary overpayments while some teachers complain of salary delays.