Presidential aspirant and Jubilee Deputy Party Leader, Dr.Fred Matiang’I, has pledged that his top priority upon assuming office would be to establish a streamlined government structure aimed at curbing the wastage of public resources.
Matiang’i argues that administrations fall prey to poor governance largely due to the unaddressed misuse of public funds, a problem that has persistently plagued Kenya’s political landscape.
The once Cabinet Secretary of Interior took aim at President William Ruto’s administration, accusing it of squandering resources through what he described as illogical expenditures and poor prioritization of government programs.
Speaking during an interview with NTV on Wednesday, Matiang’i questioned the current size of government, describing it as an unnecessary drain on public finances.
“The kind of country we have right now, I don’t understand the size of government we have. It is a drain on government resources. Sometimes, poor prioritization of government programmes is a way you cut waste,” he said.
He acknowledged that waste exists across all governments, admitting that even during his tenure in public service, he witnessed expenditures that could have been avoided.
However, he contended that the current administration has elevated such wastage to unmatched levels.
“Governments are very wasteful. Even when I was in government, there were things I saw that I could say we could do without. Every administration manages it differently. This one has taken it to a whole new level. If you have a truckload of advisors and all manner of people, all the overheads we incur are essentially wastage,” he stated.
The presidential aspirant further contended that this mismanagement of resources has severely impacted vital sectors critical to national development, particularly the education sector.
Drawing from his experience as Education Cabinet Secretary, Matiang’i cited the National Education Management Information System (NEMIS) as a case study in government waste.
He explained that NEMIS, which was designed to streamline education management and data collection, was dismantled by the current administration and replaced with the Kenya Education Management Information System (KEMIS).
NEMIS was a web-based data management platform used to collect and process information on students, teaching staff and schools to enhance efficiency, monitor performance and manage resources effectively across Kenya’s education sector.
It was however replaced by KEMIS in June 2025 by the Ministry of Education, claiming it would address the shortcomings of the error-prone NEMIS system, despite both platforms serving essentially the same purpose of data collection and verification.
Matiang’i suggested that the replacement of NEMIS was unnecessary and potentially motivated by financial interests rather than genuine system improvement.
“When this was interfered with, it means you don’t have accurate data of the learners and people you are supposed to spend resources on and my suspicion is someone wanted to issue a new tender and make money because the way the system was worked on all that could have been done was to improve it not to do away with it because all resources that were spent on it were wasted,” Matiang’i said.
He pointed out that NEMIS was launched in 2017 with substantial funding from a World Bank grant worth millions of dollars, though the exact amount spent remains unclear due to financial inconsistencies and inadequate auditing.
The system was later found to be riddled with problems, with investigations revealing that approximately Ksh.1.3 billion was lost through fraud involving ghost schools.
