Ever heard someone transfer and demote himself simultaneously?
Mr Kuyu( above) and Mr Senga (below)
This is what is unfolding in Governor Wavinya Ndeti's government after her finance minister, Muia Kuyu, ordered a mass transfer of all revenue officers in Machakos County.
The ill advised exercise has not only disrupted revenue collection but also become a fiasco, where the signatory of the letters, Mike Senga "demoted" himself in the very same letters signed for him, by Mr. David Kakonzi.
Both Kakonzi who is the Director of Revenue Collection and the Revenue Collection Chief Officer, Mike Senga, ought to report to the senior revenue officer in Mwala sub-county.
In the transfers, Senga and Kakonzi have been moved to Mwala Sub County to report at Itithini and Muthetheni Markets respectively.
It has emerged that the transfers letters were organised secretly and drafted with names of the department's staff beginning with Mike Senga's name listed therein.
The drafters of the transfer letters assumed that Senga's powers included deployment of staff yet that was the duty of the Director of Revenue Collection, Kakonzi.
When the bundle of letters was presented to Senga, he indicated his reservations in signing off, so the letters were shoved to Mr Kakonzi who quickly signed 'For' Mr Senga, whose other names are Mike Jace.
In the end, the pair found their letters within the bundle, triggering the County's most dramatic show of a backfiring administration.
The transfers affect over 500 Revenue Officers, including 435 new recruits who do not have personell numbers and have hardly mastered their new assignment.
Interestingly, a number of Wavinya Ndeti's new staff are aged between 60 and 70 years while others are youngsters who have no means to move from one Subcounty to another.
The transfers, targeted to improve revenue collection, have completely disrupted collections as those who have been affected by the impromptu transfers scramble for other means to accrue resources to report to their new stations before the reporting deadline set for January 5, 2024.
Various revenue offices in hospitals, markets, cess stations and parking lots were in paralysis since the transfers were unveiled earlier in the week.
The transfers are in response to the dismal ranking of the county in the list of revenue collectors countrywide, where Machakos reported only 2.5 percent of its target of Kes 4bn.
Sources tell The Anchor that the county may have raised more revenue than in other years but was rated poorly due to the unrealistic target that the finance minister, Muia Kuyu, unilaterally set for the Machakos County.
Critics of the transfers are questioning why the changes did not affect officers working in quarries in Athi River which are failing to meet their collection targets by over Kes 1.5M daily.
"This is the elephant in the room and Mr Kuyu knows it. The county is losing over Kes 60m monthly. This money is going into people's pockets yet innocent revenue collectors are being targeted for transfers", said an official in Mavoko who spoke anonymously due to the sensitivity of the matter.
