The Cabinet Secretary for Public Service, Human Capital Development and Special Programmes, Geoffrey Ruku, has issued a stern warning to state agencies that have not yet joined the government’s Human Resource Information System (HRIS), threatening to freeze their salary payments.
Speaking during a public service gathering on Friday, May 29, Ruku revealed that out of 575 state agencies in Kenya, only 47 are currently onboarded onto the HRIS platform, a figure he described as deeply troubling and unacceptable.
The CS gave human resource managers a two-month deadline to ensure their institutions complete the onboarding process, warning that failure to comply would have direct financial consequences for workers in those agencies.
“For the human resource managers who are here and they work with the government agencies, and you know your agency is not on-boarded on HRS, make sure in the next two months you have done what is required for your institution to be on-boarded on HRS, period to which a time is coming when we will not pay salaries and allowances if those institutions which are not on-boarded on Human Resource Information System,” warned CS Ruku.
The warning applies to a wide range of government institutions, including the National Police Service (NPS), the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF), parastatals, public universities, and Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) institutions.
The CS said the HRIS platform has been upgraded and strengthened to seal loopholes that have, for years, allowed payroll fraud to thrive undetected across government institutions.
He painted a troubling picture of the loopholes in the current system, stating: “We have cases in the National Police Service where an interdicted officer is no longer earning a salary, yet that salary continues to be paid into a certain account and ends up in someone’s pocket. There are many such cases.”
Meanwhile, Ruku confirmed that a payroll forensic audit commissioned last year has been completed, with a detailed report now in hand outlining how public funds have been misappropriated and the steps required to address the gaps.
The audit findings reportedly expose a web of ghost workers drawing salaries without ever reporting to work, duplicated names across multiple stations, and irregular allowance payments quietly inflating the public wage bill beyond sustainable levels.
“The ghost worker who draws a salary but has never reported to her desk, the duplicated names that service across multiple stations, the multiple irregular payments of allowances that quietly inflate obligations beyond what any budget can bear,” stated CS Ruku.
The CS urged all human resource managers present to take personal ownership of the onboarding process, stressing that accountability is the only path forward for a leaner and more honest public service.
This year alone, the number of ghost workers flagged has varied across audits. Auditor-General Nancy Gathungu was unable to verify 596 county employees during recent checks across multiple counties and regions, with investigations still ongoing.
Additionally, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) flagged a Ksh978 million payroll lapse, while separate local audits identified 1,783 unverified workers and over 1,000 ghost employees in Bungoma County reports.
This trend, according to CS Ruku, aims to halt this troubling pattern in the public employment sector, which might, in the long run, put the country’s job market in jeopardy-Kenyans.co.ke.
