The rot in Kenya’s education sector has been exposed in stunning detail. Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba dropped a bombshell today, revealing that the government hemorrhaged a staggering Sh912 million in just one term due to the manipulation of student data on the National Education Management Information System (NEMIS).

The scandal involves the inflation of enrollment numbers by corrupt school heads and ministry officials, creating an army of "ghost learners" to siphon capitation funds. Ogamba disclosed that an audit of the Third Term of 2025 revealed 87,730 non-existent students had been logged into the system, triggering payments that disappeared into private pockets.

The Scale of the Theft

The revelation confirms the worst fears of transparency advocates: NEMIS, designed to streamline education management, has been weaponized as a tool for looting. "We disbursed funds for 3.35 million students, but the physical count shows a different reality," Ogamba admitted. The variance represents nearly a billion shillings that could have built classrooms, hired teachers, or bought textbooks.

This is not a victimless crime. The stolen funds mean that genuine students are deprived of resources. Schools are crumbling, teacher shortages are chronic, yet money meant to fix these issues is paying for students who do not exist. The CS has vowed to crack down, but the network of corruption appears deep and entrenched.

• The Method: Rogue officials bypass verification protocols to manually enter fake names and UPIs into the NEMIS database.
• The Cleanup: The Ministry has now delayed capitation disbursements to conduct a thorough data scrub, forcing schools to operate on a shoestring budget.
• The Consequence: Ogamba has promised prosecution for those involved, stating, "We will not allow the future of our children to be stolen by a few greedy individuals."

A System on Trial

The scandal raises serious questions about the integrity of the entire education data infrastructure. If 87,000 ghosts can haunt the system in one term, how many billions have been lost over the last decade? The Auditor General had previously flagged inconsistencies, but this admission by the CS quantifies the theft in shocking terms.

For parents paying fees and taxes, the news is a slap in the face. It suggests that the crisis in school funding is not just about a lack of money, but a lack of honesty. As the DCI moves in to investigate, the education sector faces a painful reckoning. The ghosts have been busted, but the exorcism—removing the corrupt officials—will be the harder battle.