By BONIFACE MULU
Corruption is actually a cancer in this country, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) Education and Public Awareness Deputy Director, Dr. Emily Mworia has said.
“We (the EACC) are mandated by the Kenya’s government to combat corruption in the country and we are able to do so through education and awareness among others,” the anti-graft agency official further said.
“That is our mandate. We will have a corruption-prevent society,” she said. Mworia was lecturing the Kitui County’s community opinion leaders during an ethics and anti-corruption training workshop organised for them at the Kitui Multipurpose Development Training Institute by the EACC on Wednesday, December 14, 2022.
The event was chaired by Solomon Atela, an official from the EACC.
The workshop was officially opened by the Kitui Central District Commissioner Dorcas Rono who was the chief guest at the event.
On Tuesday, December 13, 2022, the EACC officials trained the Kitui County’s motorbike taxi operators (boda bodas) on integrity at the Kitui Multipurpose Development Training Institute.
And on Thursday, December 15, 2022, they trained members of the public on integrity at the Kalundu Market within Kitui Town.
“We should not get tired of fighting corruption in the country. Let us all be like pastors. The pastors do not get tired of preaching the word of God. Don’t get tired,” Mworia told participants.
Once we have undergone this training, go out and educate people on anti-corruption, she told the trainees. Mworia disclosed that every December 9 is the International Anti-Corruption Day.
“The day started being observed globally on December 9, 2002,” she said. Mworia announced that they the EACC have so far trained Kenyans on integrity in more than thirty of the country’s 47 counties.
“Our aim is to fight corruption in the country,” the officer said. And she also announced that they the commission has numerous memoranda of understandings (MOUs) with the non-governmental organisations and savings and credit cooperative societies among others regarding the war on corruption in the country.
Mworia said: “Fighting corruption starts from an individual level to the collective level. So it should begin with you. We can’t fight corruption if you yourself are not fighting the vice.
We as a commission are emphasizing on corruption prevention. So all of us should try to do something to make sure that the corruption is eradicated in the country.” The official highly thanked the Kitui opinion leaders for attending the training well.
The team leader Solomon Atela also lectured the participants. And in her lecture, the EACC Education Officer Eunice Nding’o talked about the financial management (embezzlement of funds, fraud), public procurement (bid-rigging, bribery, conflict of interest, value for money), recruitment (nepotism, ghost workers), high risk corruption areas identified by the EACC and prevention and stoppage of corruption among others.
“We (the commission) have already repossessed a lot of the grabbed public lands and other stolen public property including funds in the country. All the stolen public property in the country will be repossessed and returned to the public by the EACC,” Nding’o said.
The EACC has its headquarters at the Integrity Centre in Nairobi. The agency’s regional report centres are in Mombasa, Kisumu, Eldoret, Nyeri, Garissa, Malindi, Machakos, Isiolo, Nakuru and Kisii Towns. And each Huduma Centre in Kenya has a desk officer from the EACC.
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