Facts, myths and misconceptions on the downfall of Unaitas SACCO – part 2 of 7

Unaitas is a Cooperative society limited that started as Muramati in 1993.  

In 2013, Muramati rebranded and transformed into Unaitas. This was in a quest to expand from its home base to all parts of Kenya.

Currently, the Sacco has close to 300, 000 members who have bought a minimum of 100 shares worth Ksh10.

During the rebranding, Unaitas developed a strategic plan for 2013-2018 whose key highlight was transformation into a commercial bank by September 2016. 

This led to a massive recruitment drive to sell shares that boosted Unaitas share capital. . Since then, Unaitas has been on the growth path with recently opening its 25th branch in Kisumu, which was closely followed by opening branches in Kisii and Eldoret.

In the recent past, Unaitas has been facing many issues as will be covered deeply by this blog. 

Despite Sassra getting a dossier from insiders and the National Intelligence Service about the rot at Unaitas, the Sacco and Societies Regulatory Authority officials stopped following or investigating the rot after being oiled.

The most serious of the issues is the cooking of books by the current CEO Martin Muhoho whose appetite for anything in a skirt makes him do creative accounting to get the chums needed to maintain his multiple girlfriends many within Unaitas.

Corporate governance within Unaitas doesn’t exist. The Governance issue is at the board level whereby most decisions are made out of emotions and political lynching. It is at this point that professionalism is kept aside and the politics of clans is employed.

The Damning NIS Dossier That Dimmed Unaitas Sacco Dream Of Being A Bank

This has led to many unprofessional decisions to be undertaken as follows;

Almost all senior managers have exited the organization as a result of political lynching by the board. The list below attests to this; In 2016, the senior management was comprised of the following;

• Tony Mwangi – CEO
• Harun Mwirigi – GM Commercial 
• Jadiel Kinyua- GM Finance and Strategy
• Nyaga Thagichu – GM Operations 

Due to the political bickering on the board, several changes saw the scrapping of the titles of General Managers to Chief Managers in their respective portfolios. This led to the expansion of the senior management team to include the following; 

• Tony Mwangi – CEO
• Nyaga Thagichu – Chief Manager HR & Administration
• Peter Njuguna – Chief Manager Commercial 
• Harun Mwirigi – Chief Manager Finance and Strategy
• Martin Muhoho – Chief Manager Risk and Compliance (Initially he had occupied the position of Internal Auditor)
• Edwin Njeru – Chief Manager Internal Audit (He was a newly recruited staff to head this function.
• Joseph Muratha – Chief manager ICT (Note his exit introduces another chapter of the circus to be illustrated below)
• Catherine Muriuki – Chief Manager Credit

Between 2017 and 2018, half of the chief managers in the list above exited due to governance issues at the board level. They include Nyaga Thagichu, Harun Mwirigi, Joseph Muratha and Catherine Muriuki.

With the exit of Harun and Muratha, the following were recruited;

• Irene Langat – Chief Manager ICT (Irene was recruited during the implementation of the new Core banking system that was bought to the tune of about 700 Million. She was recruited from CBA bank, which operated under a similar system.

• Rosemary Karanja –Chief Manager Finance and Strategy

Irene had taken up the position of Joseph Muratha who resigned under unclear circumstances. His resignation came shortly after Unaitas was hit by a massive cyber fraud that led to the loss of Kshs28 Million. (It is not clear to date what transpired and there was no official communication on how the money was lost 

In 2018, Irene resigned under unclear circumstances. Her exit was said to have been occasioned by non-performance, especially the challenges experienced by the new Core banking system. 

From the above, it is evident that there has been a clear challenge to governance at the senior management level, a position that is key in driving the organization forward. 

Other exits after these years have been documented in our earlier article which has been attached hereunder.

THE FALL OF A GIANT

Sassra, that this blog has always called for its disbandment has been watching as the Sacco is looted and books cooked as will be exposed later, with no action as most of them are under the payroll of Martin Muhoho. 

The exit of Mr. Tony Mwangi and the entry of Martin Muhoho are key in our next articles as we seek to understand and reveal all the under dealings and expose the gaps within the Unaitas Board of Directors and broken corporate governance systems within Unaitas. 

Catch us, soon! 

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