Parliamentary committee is to summon officials of the Kenya Secondary School Heads Association (KSSHA) to explain how millions of shillings paid by public secondary schools to the association are spent.
The National Assembly’s Public Investments Committee on Governance and Education raised concerns over direct payments to KSSHA after the Auditor-General questioned the legality and accountability of some of the transactions.
The committee, chaired by Luanda MP Dick Maungu, is examining Auditor-General’s reports covering selected secondary schools between the 2020-21 and 2024-25 financial years.
The inquiry is being conducted during a committee retreat in Kisumu. An audit of Asumbi Girls High School found that the school transferred Sh1.247m to KSSHA in the year to June 2024.
The Auditor-General questioned the payment, describing KSSHA as a welfare organisation whose members include school principals and which is not part of the government’s formal funding system.
The audit said there was no assurance that KSSHA had effective and transparent financial management and internal control systems for funds received from schools.
It also found that the payment contravened Regulation 23(2)(c) of Kenya’s Public Finance Management (National Government) Regulations, 2015, which requires an accounting officer to obtain written assurance from an organisation before transferring funds to it.
The Auditor-General said the school was in breach of the law and that it could not confirm whether value for money had been achieved from the Sh1.247m expenditure.
However, Asumbi Girls principal Linet Pino Sati told MPs that the money was used to support co-curricular activities.
She said KSSHA sends schools annual requests for contributions towards activities involving students.
Maseno School principal Peter Owino Otieno also defended the payments, saying they supported student welfare and participation in sports, drama, music and other competitions.
He said schools that failed to contribute risked their students being excluded from regional and national competitions.
Nyabururu Girls High School principal Joyce Orioki told the committee that KSSHA also coordinates activities at grassroots and zonal levels, with contributions generally based on student enrolment.
She acknowledged that the association’s accounts were not audited, saying this was an issue that needed to be addressed.
But Maungu said the explanations had raised further questions about the use of public money.
“What is coming out clearly is that most of these schools contribute money to an organisation known as KSSHA,” he said.
The committee heard that one school had paid about Sh6m to KSSHA over five years, while another had paid about Sh5m.
Maungu said the total amount could reach billions of shillings if similar payments were made by public schools across the country.
“We want to find out whether KSSHA is a recipient of public money and whether the activities they are undertaking are audited by the Auditor-General,” he said.
Kiminini MP Maurice Kakai Bisau questioned why public schools were transferring money to an organisation he described as a private club.
“KSSHA remains a private club managed by members of the teaching fraternity,” he said.
Lungalunga MP Chiforomodo Mangale said the committee needed to establish the legal basis for the payments.
“We must start from the point of understanding how these funds are transferred. KSSHA is an association for teachers and school heads, but it has no direct relationship with government,” he said.
Maungu said the committee was not questioning the importance of co-curricular activities, but whether public funds could legally be channelled through KSSHA.
“The education activities may be good and necessary, but that does not mean public funds can be transferred outside the framework of the law,” he said.
The committee will ask KSSHA officials to explain the association’s legal status, its relationship with the Ministry of Education, how much it receives from public schools and how the money is accounted for.
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