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(Rtd) Joseph Muracia fired as Nairobi Rivers Commission CEO

The CEO of the Nairobi Rivers Commission, Brigadier (Rtd) Joseph Muracia, has been fired from his job immediately because of serious issues like misconduct, corruption, stealing money, hiring family members over others (nepotism), and refusing to follow orders (insubordination).

A meeting on Tuesday afternoon, led by former Starehe MP Margaret Wanjiru, decided to remove him from his position, and everyone agreed on this decision.

Muracia was appointed by former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua to help clean and restore Nairobi’s rivers. However, he has been accused of taking advantage of the organization’s weaknesses to misuse funds.

The Nairobi Rivers Commission has only been working for less than two years. An audit for the 2023/2024 financial year showed that there was significant mismanagement of money under Muracia’s leadership, resulting in a loss of over Kshs. 150 million.

The audit found many problems, such as buying things at very high prices and missing paperwork for delivered items. For example, goods worth Kshs. 20,234,474 were delivered without important documents like tax invoices.

Some of the irregular purchases include:

  • – Shalmac Technologies sold 12 desktop computers for Kshs. 3,000,000, while the fair price should have been Kshs. 1,896,000, meaning they overcharged by Kshs. 1,104,000, which is a 158% increase.
  • – Shelvis Enterprises sold 17 printers for Kshs. 2,975,000, much more than the market price of Kshs. 1,139,000, resulting in an overcharge of Kshs. 1,836,000, or 261%.
  • – Simora Group supplied 10 laptops at Kshs. 2,980,000, when the market price was Kshs. 1,250,000, leading to an overcharge of Kshs. 1,730,000, or 238%.

The report also said that Muracia claimed to have hired 20,000 workers called “Climate Worx,” but many of them were not real employees (ghost employees).

A budget of Kshs. 200 million for allowances was poorly managed, and a lot of money could not be accounted for.

Muracia also faced accusations of nepotism because he hired family members to work for the commission and paid them more than other workers.

He was reported to be rude and disrespectful towards Commissioners, often using bad language and not involving them in important decisions. People described his way of leading as dictatorial, focusing more on his own benefits rather than the goals of the commission.

His firing is an important step towards fighting corruption and bringing back honesty in the Nairobi Rivers Commission.

The government has promised to look deeper into these issues and to recover the lost money to prevent such problems from happening again.

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