In just a matter of months, former Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero recalls pumping Ksh418 million for his re-election campaign in 2017.
Sadly, he did not defend his seat. He lost it to Jubilee’s flagbearer for Nairobi governorship Mike Sonko who lost the seat months ago through impeachment.
From court records in graft charges that Kidero is fighting, they broke down how he spent the colossal amount of money for his campaign.
Details show that he pumped Ksh 53 million to set up a campaign centre. He then spent Ksh 37 million on his ODM party.
For 36 months, Kidero rented office space that coordinated his political campaigns for Ksh7 million.
He spent Ksh 8 million in research and poll tracking and another Ksh20 million on the day of the launch of his bid.
Party nominations cost Kidero Ksh25 million while media and publicity gobbled up Ksh 75 million.
Publicity materials cost Ksh 47 million and his agents got Ksh 55 million in reimbursements.
When the polls kicked in, he spent Ksh25 million monitoring with all his campaign vehicles spending Ksh19 million for fuel and another Ksh19 million for repairs.
Entertainment for his campaigners cost him Ksh 6 million and an additional Ksh16 million as capital expenditure.
This was brought before the court seeking a response on how he planned to recover this money given that his total monthly income as a governor was Ksh 1 ,056,000. In five years, he would have earned Ksh63.4 million.
In past cases, investigations have revealed that the high campaign costs involved fuel corruption in counties as contractors inflate costs and governors ask for kickbacks for tenders awarded.
