In Homabay County, the health sector is no longer about saving lives.
According to a detailed post by Odoyo Owidi, it has become the main tool for draining public money. At the center of this storm is Governor Gladys Wanga, who is accused of turning hospitals into a personal cash cow while patients suffer without basic medicines or proper care.
The numbers tell a painful story. For the 2025/26 financial year, Homabay County has a total budget of 13 billion shillings. Out of this, a huge 8.539 billion shillings goes to health.
But here is the trap: 5.3 billion of that is marked as recurrent expenditure, which means it disappears into salaries and other repeated costs.
Only 3.239 billion is left for real development like building hospitals. One major project, the 200 million shilling Emergency Teaching and Referral Hospital, has been stalled since 2024.
No one is explaining why.
Governor Wanga has created a system where money collected from patients is treated as “own source revenue.”
Under this plan, 80 percent of that money goes straight to an account that the governor controls. Only 20 percent stays with the local health facilities.
This setup guarantees that the governor always has easy access to cash. And what do patients get in return?
Reports from inside Homabay hospitals say there are barely any painkillers. Patients are fed boiled omena, a very small fish, and cover themselves with torn old blankets known as “kalara.”
Utility bills go unpaid, and medicines are missing from the shelves. The budget itself shows a drop.
In 2024, the health budget was 8.79 billion shillings.
In 2025, it fell to 8.539 billion. This makes no sense because the national government increases health funding every year. So where is all the money going?
The accusation is clear: it is being slowly siphoned off.
The governor’s siblings are said to supply nearly all essential goods and services in the county, including car hires like the Proboxes used to transport county workers who assault political opponents.
Meanwhile, senior county staff spend their weekends in Kisumu’s entertainment spots, drinking and socializing with their feet on tables and underwear turned into headgear.
Gladys Wanga came to office with promises of better healthcare and transparency. But under her watch, the health budget has shrunk, construction has stopped, and patients are treated like burdens rather than human beings.
The post argues that counties should be forced to publish every small detail of their spending. Without that, the public will never know why hospitals have no drugs while the governor’s family gets rich.
This is not leadership. It is a slow robbery of the sick and the poor. And the people of Homabay are watching.
