Migori blames 'corrupt staff' for failure to meet revenue targets

Governor Ochillo Ayacko’s administration has admitted it is struggling to reach own source revenue targets, a situation that an official has attributed to corruption.

While addressing journalists in Migori town, Director Revenue Maurice Oindo admitted that they were losing a lot of revenue due to corrupt practices by staff.

“You find that a member of staff can agree with a businessperson on a fee that is lower and split the remaining amount,” said Oindo.

According to the director, there were also revenue collectors who ask traders to pay whatever they have, which they pocket, thus the traders avoid paying revenue.

He also revealed that some revenue staff duplicate receipts, especially at the bus parks and livestock auction markets.

“The receipt is divided into two, where they use the counterfoil and the original receipt. These are some of the areas where we are losing a lot of money,” Oindo remarked.

The Migori County Government uses both automated and manual revenue collection systems, which still expose it to theft by staff and other loopholes which result in loss of revenue.

Revenue collection had been automated in areas that include health, single business permits, market dues, cess on building materials and agricultural products.

Bus Park, cattle auction and boda boda sector are some of the areas that still use manual revenue collection systems. According to the revenue director, these are the areas where a lot of money is lost to corrupt revenue by staff.

Last year, the county government had set a target of Sh600 million and only collected Sh406 million.

This year, it had a target of Sh620 million but failed to meet the target, after collecting Sh512 million.

During the 2022 election campaigns, then candidate Ayacko and his running mate Gimunta Mahiri had pledged to automate revenue collection within their first 100 days in office.

Last year, the Governor pledged that his administration would strengthen revenue collection strategies which would enable the closing of corruption loopholes, reduction of wastages and maximum automation of revenue collection.

Yesterday, Oindo said they had put in place measures which include having compliance teams to ensure they collect enough revenue.

He revealed plans to work with Safaricom from January next year to have money collected from traders going directly to the County Government’s accounts without the revenue officers having to touch it.

“We will be doing STK push where revenue collectors will only be asking for traders’ phone numbers and have the machine send a confirmation message where the trader records their M-Pesa numbers for payment,” Oindo explained.

He said they are looking forward to having cashless revenue collection to reduces theft.