The Senate has ordered Nairobi county to resume construction of the stalled Dandora stadium.
The stadium has been under investigation by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission since 2019.
The legislators said the works should resume as EACC continues with the probe.
The stadium is a flagship project of Former Governor Mike Sonko.
The project has stalled since 2019 when EACC moved to probe the alleged procurement irregularities believed to have cost the taxpayers millions of shillings.
Sonko’s administration was accused of making Sh196.9 million irregular payment to the contractor and irregular change of the contract name.
The Senate’s resolution followed an inquiry into the stalled works by the House Labour and Social Welfare committee chaired by Senator Johnson Sakaja.
“This Senate has resolved to give the county government a go-ahead to complete this stadium, which is 65 per cent done. Only a very small portion is remaining,” a report by the committee read in part.
“That Nairobi county government reviews the terms under the law and completes the Dandora Stadium Project.”
“Due to public interest, the EACC concludes on its investigation on the matter as the works continue. There is no reason why Dandora Stadium is not being completed,” Sakaja said while tabling the report on the floor last Thursday.
The Senate, through its clerk Jeremiah Nyegenye, has written to Governor Anne Kananu asking for the implementation of the house resolution.
“The committee resolved that the Nairobi county pay the contractor for all the works done including the installed steel sitting terraces, to expedite on the completion of the project,” Nyegenye said in the letter copied to NMS boss Mohamed Badi and Mbarak.
Kananu is expected to submit monthly reports on the status of implementation of the resolution to the senate, with the first one expected on January 18, 2022.
In October, EACC chief executive Twalib Mbarak said the commission’s preliminary findings revealed flaws in the procurement process.
“The investigations have established some irregularities in the procurement process about the contract discharge and administration phase,” Mbarak had told the committee.
The stadium is being constructed at Sh350 million by M/s Scanjet Construction.
It was among the four stadia that Sonko’s administration initiated at Sh1.03 billion.
“So far, the Nairobi county government has paid Sh137.52 million to the contractor in four instalments,” Mbarak had said.
EACC took up the matter after revelations by the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority that the county and the contractor changed the terms of the contract midway.
“The dispute occasioned by the contractor’s deviation from reinforced concrete terraces to steel as evidenced in the various correspondences between the county and the contractor,” Mbarak said.
PPRA had questioned the payment of Sh196.87 million by the contractor despite technical evaluators questioning the quality of the work.
“The Dandora contract was for the construction of concrete structures, however, the contractor supported by officers at the county put up steel structures,” a report by PPRA reads in part.
The authority has recommended investigations to establish if the contract documents, including a cabinet memo that allegedly sanctioned the putting up of steel structures instead of concrete, were forged.
Edited by Kiilu Damaris