NAIROBI, Kenya— In a damning report tabled before Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee, Auditor‑General Nancy Gathungu has revealed that over Sh11 billion collected via the e‑Citizen digital payment platform was diverted to private accounts belonging to unidentified individuals.
The findings mark a major scandal in Kenya’s digital service transition.
According to Gathungu’s report, Sh127 million was traced directly to individuals linked with the scheme transferred from the official paybill to private accounts rather than the government’s designated settlement wallet, in breach of the law.
Other irregularities cited include Sh2.5 billion in unaccounted‑for receipts, caused by partial, erroneous, or duplicate payments.
“It was not clear why the balance had been classified as partial, incomplete and duplicated, and what efforts Management was taking to clear the amount from its records,”read the report in part.
The audit further flagged Sh 7.05 billion in collections stuck in limbo due to the absence of Service Level Agreements (SLAs) between the Treasury and payment partners, making the funds untraceable.
Meanwhile, tourism levy payments revealed a Sh 515 million discrepancy in the e‑Citizen reporting module.
The report underscores a troubling lack of oversight:absence of reconciliations, no clear audit trails, and the fact that e‑Citizen remains managed by a private contractor, compelling government to rely on external firms for system changes.
e‑Citizen Services Onboarded
The government has been onboarding its services to the e-citizen portal facing out the manual payment of services.
By June 2024, the government had onboarded a staggering 17,692 government services to the e‑Citizen portal, including more than 5,000 added in that fiscal year alone.
Earlier in late 2023, officials had reported over 14,000 services operational, with full onboarding expected by year’s end.
This scandal now forces a reckoning in Kenya’s digital transformation journey exposing systemic risks that could undermine public trust.
