For decades, Kenya’s national secondary schools have been celebrated for producing top examination performers, sending students to universities, winning sporting titles and dominating national competitions.
But more than 30 of these institutions are now facing a different kind of examination — one that has little to do with grades and everything to do with how they manage public money.
The National Assembly Committee on Governance and Education is scrutinising the financial affairs of national, or C1, schools over five financial years from 2020 to 2025, working alongside the Auditor-General to examine how millions of shillings entrusted to the institutions were received, spent and accounted for.
The hearings have not revealed one uniform picture of financial mismanagement. Instead, they have opened a window into a range of challenges confronting public secondary schools, from payments to private organisations and discrepancies in student numbers to questionable investment returns, accumulated fee arrears, infrastructure costs and the difficulties schools face in moving to modern public-sector accounting systems.
At the centre of the hearings is Luanda MP Dickson Maungu, chairman of the committee, who has repeatedly pressed school managers to explain not only how money was spent but also whether the expenditure complied with the law and delivered value.
One of the most persistent questions has centred on payments made by schools to the Kenya Secondary School Heads Association (KESSHA).
The committee was told that one school had paid about Sh6 million to KESSHA over five years, while another had transferred nearly Sh5 million.
“If you convert them into all the schools in the country, there are billions going to KESSHA, and we want to find out whether KESSHA is a recipient of public money,” Maungu said.
School principals have defended the payments, saying the money is used to support students participating in sports, drama, music and other co-curricular competitions.
Maseno School principal Peter Owino Otieno told MPs, “Management fully accepts the auditor’s observation regarding the transfers made to KESSHA. These transfers were made in good faith strictly to facilitate students’ co-curricular and extracurricular activities and without paying them, the institution’s students are completely locked out and disallowed from participating in sports, drama, music or other regional and national talent competitions.”
The concern for lawmakers, however, is whether public institutions can channel public funds to an organisation outside the Government’s formal financing structure while maintaining clear accountability.
Kiminini MP Maurice Kakai Bisau said, “KESSHA remains a private club, a private organisation managed by principals in the teaching fraternity. In the absence of it being formalised, we still look at it as a private members’ organisation.”
Lungalunga MP Chiforomodo Mangale said the legality of the transfers needed to be established.
“We must start from the point of understanding how these funds are transferred to KESSHA. KESSHA is an association for teachers and school heads, but it has no direct relationship with government,” he said.
The hearings have also shown that even student enrolment figures can become a matter of public financial accountability.
At Limuru Girls High School, discrepancies between physical records and figures captured in NEMIS resulted in an additional Sh785,946 in capitation.
Chief Principal Susan Kariuki rejected any suggestion that the figures had been deliberately inflated.
“The school did not intentionally provide inflated enrolment figures.”
The explanation, however, led Maungu to ask what happened to the additional money.
“So, because you are given more money, where do you take it?” Maungu asked.
The school later said it had strengthened reconciliation between NEMIS/KEMIS data, admission records and class attendance.
Investment decisions have also come under scrutiny. A Sh9 million fixed deposit generated about Sh116,000 in interest, which was not reflected in the cash-flow statement at the time of the audit.
At Bishop Gatimu Ngandu Girls High School, MPs questioned a Sh1.5 million investment in the Nairobi Securities Exchange that generated only Sh5,381 in dividends during the year under review.
“This year, we got Sh5,381 as dividends,” Chief Principal Jane Njuguna told the committee.
Maungu questioned whether the investment provided sufficient value.
“Let’s look at the value for money. Five thousand in one million what percentage is that in terms of return? We may need to really dig deep into that,” Maungu said.
MP Francis Sigei also questioned whether parents had participated in approving the investment.
“I would like to know whether this issue was tabled in the AGM for parents, because we would like to have minutes for public participation on parents agreeing to invest this amount of money in the NSE,” he said.
The school's bursar conceded, “Economically, I would say that it could not maybe give value for money.”
At Mang’u High School, MPs turned their attention to another long-running problem — unpaid fees.
The school reported Sh19.9 million in accounts receivable, with some debts dating back 10 years.
Principal Bernard Mwangi Kingah said students were not sent home over unpaid fees and that the school did not retain their certificates.
“We don't send them back home for school fees at all once the students have come to school and at Mang'u High School has not retained certificates. Yes, there are students who have been having arrears for the last 10 years,” Kingah said.
The committee urged the school to address the old debts rather than allowing them to remain indefinitely in its accounts.
Financial pressure has also emerged at schools with major infrastructure projects.
The Kenya High School recorded income of about Sh322.9 million against expenditure of Sh328.3 million, leaving a Sh5.4 million deficit. Government capitation had fallen to Sh26.1 million, while the school was implementing a Science Technology Centre whose contracted cost stood at Sh159.7 million.
Nairobi School, meanwhile, reported a deficit of 58 infrastructure units while serving 2,481 students. It was developing a Sh65.08 million Science Complex and had completed a dormitory complex costing about Sh176.7 million.
The hearings have therefore exposed a complex reality: schools that are nationally admired for academic and extracurricular achievements are also institutions handling substantial public resources, major construction projects, student fees and investments.
The transition to modern accounting systems has added another layer to the challenge.
“The shift from the school audit system, where they used to operate using different systems, to the new systems has been a challenge,” Kingah said.
He added, “Some of these schools are not shifting to Public Sector Accounting Standards. We need to know why, and they need to be empowered so that they can be able to do the right thing.”
As Parliament continues examining the accounts, the traditional measures of a successful school — examination results, university admissions and trophies — are being joined by another standard: accountability.
For Maungu, the expectation is that public money entrusted to schools should remain traceable from allocation to expenditure.
“Every learner counted for capitation must be verifiable. Every investment must have proper approval and demonstrable purpose. Every payment outside the school must have a lawful basis. Every public shilling must leave a trace and every school entrusted with public resources must be able to explain, years later, not simply where the money went, but why it went there and what it achieved.”