When we last reported on the financial scam at Moi University, we were modest enough to apportion blame on VC Prof. Richard Mibey not as a corrupt man but some round peg in a square hole. Well, sorry guys: we were wrong. Prof. Mibey may actually be a corrupt, absolutely corrupt man. But this is not the story.
According to our sources, impeccably placed within the Eldoret-based institution and very credible, some 600 final year students will miss graduation this December. Most of them are self-sponsored students. This is in addition to some 400 who missed last year and several hundreds at law school whose fates remain embedded in the legal gymnastics the university is pulling in the courts which saw it get temporary reprieve to continue running the school.
Why aren’t students graduating? Simple: They were not assessed. The university did not release funds to allow lecturers move around assessing each student doing academic internship. Industrial assessment is a partial requirement for graduation. The hardest hit are students in the professional schools: Human Resource Management and Business faculties.
Why was money not released? Simple: Massive theft!
Moi University is stealing from students. Moi University is stealing from the national government. Moi University is stealing even from itself! From virtually every income generating source of funds it is running, money is being looted. Big money.
Take for example the parking lot in Nairobi. A few years ago the university bought this land – near Kenya Utalii College -to construct its city campus. They turned it into a parking lot. Our source at City Hall tell us they were not paying rates. The county government of Nairobi already sent them a demand note. Yet, this parking lot accrues to the university – in sweet estimates – some sh 100,000 daily.
The story starts at the Finance Department of the university headed by Ms. Milka Mutwol.
See, you know corrupt institutions by the kind of lifestyles those working in the finance department live. A lifestyle audit of the finance department of Moi University will reveal positive results for wanton theft, negligence, sex-for-favours, arrogance, incompetence, tribalism and pretty much every thing that define corruption.
Atop this rotten department is Ms Mutwol. She’s a historical. She joined Moi the same date Vasco da Gama arrived in Mombasa! In other words, her long stay is testament to her craftiness. Not long ago, students from the institution used to think she was Prof. J.K Sang’s ”squeeze”. Prof. J.K Sang was the former Chief Administrative Officer. However,Sang was sacked but Mutwol miraculously survived!
Evil students suggested she sold her soul to Mibey, a good weak, incompetent but likeable man with a heavy Kalenjin accent and patent on ‘inventing’ some dye. Â Students used to say Prof. Mibey invented latex, the ‘thing’ used to make condoms. But this is not a story on condoms!
A few years ago, and completely hidden from the nation at large, the university witnessed a massive financial fraud involving its finance department. Millions of shillings were lost. Millions greased the palms of almost everyone. Internal and external auditors. Ministry of higher education officials (one William Ruto was the higher education minister then). Student leaders. Virtually everyone who needed to bought was bought; some expensively, some cheaply. Some administrators – fall guys though – were sacked and the new look finance department became not just dirtier but also craftier.
However, the cashflow problems of that scam never faded away. How did Moi not sink? It admitted more PSSP students. It admitted more students. It got more money -from government and donors – but it never learnt a thing.
The worst thing from that scam is that Moi University not only started defaulting when it comes to paying lecturers but it also started relying on cheap labour from post-graduate students to do the donkey work. Many hard-working lecturers with qualifications could not meet the needs of their families. Many started doing ‘part time’ teaching jobs in mushrooming colleges in the towns they were staying. Some were taking ‘top up’ jobs from other universities.
Students developed jokes around it. That if you meet a lecturer marking students transcripts in a matatu; then, may be, that lecturer is from Moi University! LOL (lauging out loudly). In other words, Moi University lecturers were underpaid. Their allowances – despite handling bloated classes overflowing with PSSP (module II) students – were not being paid.
Instead, the money was being squandered by the top management of the universty, assisted by Milka Mutwol’s finance department. Milka Mutwol herself went full scale real estate. Rumour has it her luxury hotel in Mombasa will start admitting guests this week and the one in Eldoret is being roofed. How did a woman who earned so little lived so large? Answer: She stole (and is still stealing) from so many. And yet this is not a story about Milka.
Guys, Moi University is a scandal. Students graduating from that institution know it. Lecturers working for that institution know it. Right now as I type this, NorthriftNews blog reports school of business lecturers have threatened a mass action – a go slow.
Every so often I meet former students of the institution who swear they’ll never return to Cheboiywo, the village where Main Campus is located.
This post is to pay tribute to the 600 students not graduating this December because Moi University Vice Chancellor is a weak, incompetent, corrupt man. It is also a call to the national government to do a forensic audit of Moi University Finace department and administration. The institution is risking the future of thousands of students.
It is wrong. It is wrong. It is wrong.
Leave a Reply