Sports Principal Secretary Joe Okudo has confirmed that the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) has been given the green light to investigate the Football Kenya Federation and its president Nick Mwendwa on how a sum of Ksh. 244.6 million was used.
The government gave the federation the aforementioned money to prepare for the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations that was held in Egypt, where the Harambee Stars performed were eliminated in the group stage.
There are also questions on how the under-pressure head used Ksh. 11 million from the aforementioned amount, as well as the sum of Ksh 57 million which was allegedly used in allowances.
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What else was said?
“The Cabinet Secretary Ministry of Sports and Heritage has also subsequently written to the Registrar of Sports to undertake a thorough financial audit of all the accounts of the Football Kenya Federation,” Okudo told the MPs on Tuesday as quoted by the Business Daily.
“We have also engaged and secured the backing of the International Federation of Association Football (Fifa) in our investigations. Federations have been hiding behind the threat of ban for government interference in sports federations.
“We wrote to the DCI on October 15, 2019, and there has been back and forth because the FKF rushed to court to stop the probe. However, the court two weeks ago allowed the DCI to move into FKF saying the federation has a case to answer.”
Fifa officials arrive in Kenya
Meanwhile, Fifa has sent three officials to Kenya just a week after the Cabinet Secretary for Sports, Amina Mohamed, ordered a thorough audit of the FKF accounts.
The source from the Federation confirmed to Goal that Fifa are not happy with the decision by the government to audit the accounts of the federation and they have asked the federation not to give out their Fifa accounts.
But the FKF CEO Barry Otieno denied the above: “It is true we have a Fifa delegation coming into the country today [Tuesday] for a three-day Fifa mission,” he told Goal.
“The visit was pre-planned and has not been occasioned by the recent directive by the Ministry of Sports to inspect the federation.”