Property Markets Integrity Watch Group (PMIWG) has criticized county managers of public funds for allegedly creating distortions in their market prices in order to get kickbacks as a favour.
According to the PMIWG chair John Kirima, county executives and members of parliaments are the two top most notorious inhibitors of solely integrity-based transactions in property markets, driving the property prices obscenely up.
The official further disclosed that counties’ procurement departments were very much willing to buy property whose prices had been inflated upwards to a high of 2,000 percent with the intention of sharing the extra costs.
Kirima said the counties’ property pricing mechanisms for real estates were inciting sellers to demand extremely abnormal prices when disposing off lands and buildings to the county governments.
Senate Deputy Speaker Kembi Gitura concurred with the sentiments, adding that devolved funds were being misused thus locking out the middle and low-income earners wishing to invest in the lucrative sector.
Garissa County executives are no exception to this caliber of managers, given the fact that Jama's administration has in the past been mentioned in several graft cases involving tender awards and procurement deals.