US stops aid to a Kenyan education program

The US has announced that they are going to stop giving to Kenya's education programs after an audit found more than $1 million dollars missing. This follows the UK's decision in December to stop giving to the education program.

The Kenyan program showed good promise when it started in 2003, enrolling over 1 million children who had never attended school before. Now the program's effectiveness has been slowed due to corruption and graft.

From this Associated Press story that we found at NPR, we read more of the stop funding announcement made by the US Ambassador to Kenya.

The U.S. made the decision based on claims late last year that Education Ministry officials misappropriated 100 million shillings ($1.3 million) of Kenyan government and donor funds to finance the country's much-lauded free primary school education program, U.S. Ambassador Michael Ranneberger told a luncheon of the American Chamber of Commerce in Kenya.
...

The U.S. funding was to cost $7 million and begin this year, the ambassador said.

Kenya's Finance Ministry audited the program late last year and found the funds missing. Britain announced in December it was suspending its funding of the program.

Britain's funding totaled 55 million sterling pounds ($88.8 million) over a five-year period, beginning in 2005. The December suspension saw the last tranche of funding, 10 million sterling pounds ($16.1 million), withheld.