A court in Nairobi has ordered a former employee of the Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company to pay back more than Ksh6.7 million in salaries after finding that he got the job using a forged secondary school certificate, according to reports in The Star and Kenyans.co.ke.

Judgment was delivered on 29 October 2026 at the Milimani Anti-Corruption Court. The reports do not name the man, and his employer is a state-owned utility.

What the court found

Both reports say the man presented a Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) certificate showing a mean grade of C plain for the 2002 examinations. His actual result was D plain. He used the altered certificate to secure his job at the utility.

The court convicted him on four counts: fraudulent acquisition of public property, uttering a false document, deceiving a principal, and presenting a forged certificate. He was acquitted of a separate charge of forging the certificate himself.

Refund and fines

The court ordered him to refund Ksh6,742,673, the salary he was paid between November 2016 and December 2023. He must serve four years in prison if he does not pay. He was also fined a total of Ksh800,000 across the four counts, with default prison terms set for each fine. Together the refund and fines come to about Ksh7.54 million.

The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) investigated the case after receiving a report that the employee had used falsified qualifications, then passed the file to the Director of Public Prosecutions with a recommendation to prosecute. In its statement on the verdict, the commission said the case shows why public bodies should verify qualifications during recruitment.

The ruling is one of a series of recent Kenyan cases in which courts have ordered public servants to repay salaries earned on forged academic papers, part of a wider government drive to check credentials across the public service.

Verifying school-leaving certificates

Employers checking a KCSE or similar school-leaving certificate should confirm the result directly with the examining body rather than relying on a photocopy or scan. They should compare the candidate number, year and grade against the official record, and keep a written note of the confirmation in the personnel file.

Sources

This News Desk report summarises information published by the sources above, written in our own words. Persons named in criminal matters are accused, not convicted, unless a court has ruled otherwise. To report an error, use our contact page.

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