Nakuru youth call for accountability from Kihika on county spending

Nakuru residents have demanded accountability from the county government over county spending.

Through an X Space organised by Nakuru youth, residents were able to share their views with the main topic of discussion being the Senate Public Accounts Committee (PAC) investigation into the Auditor General's report on Nakuru County government.

A total of 3007 people participated in the discussion which lasted 2 hours and 50 minutes with @abbiezuena co-hosting alongside @willieoeba and @victorngatia. 

As expected, everyone had different views on the issues being discussed, which made for a really interesting conversation from the 40 speakers who had the chance to share their thoughts. 

At the beginning the conversations focused to video clips that had been circulating online for most of the week. 

The videos circulating showed Nakuru Governor Susan Kihika appearing before the Senate PAC.

In her submission, @abbiezuena said she saw a struggling governor who was not aware of what was happening in the county. 

Gabriel Towach then came in to demand accountability, saying that by now the governor should have come out clearly through her communications team to explain the facts. 

"We should be able to get factual information from the Governor herself and not through the numerous bloggers," Towach said. 

At some point, @arnoldmartin's pointed to the fact that the Senate inquiry was about the 2021/2022 financial year, and that was before Kihika took office, and discussing the 2022/2023 financial year, which had not been tabled in the Senate, was prejudging a lot of things. 

This shifted the conversation to who is to blame for the situation the country is in and what exactly should be discussed in the forum. 

@dennischege said, "You cannot invite a mother to a child naming ceremony if she is not at the dowry ceremony".  Meaning that if the report has nothing to do with the current regime, then that should be made clear. 

@KENT4890 then came in and said that at the end of all this the Senate will produce a report and if there are any questions that have not been answered to their satisfaction then the people responsible will be held accountable. 

"We should also be looking at solutions and not just highlighting the problem so that at the end of this, when we even make a proposal and give it to the governor, we will have our own suggestions on how we think she can best solve all these problems," he said. 

For his part, @koechkbett said the Auditor General's reports have consistently shown irregularities, but the people don't demand accountability. 

"We should stop being on the side of all these politicians and be on the side of the people," he said. 

Another space has been organised for next Friday.