BY NIKKO TANU

The chairman of the Council of Governors, Mr Isaac Rutto, has hit out at Jubilee government for not being committed to devolution.

During a tour of Kenya Tea Packers (KETEPA) premises in Kericho, Mr Rutto maintained that the governors would not relent in their push for a referendum to increase the powers of the senate and allocation of national revenue to the county governments.

“We are going on with our plans as there is no indication that the national government is about to respect devolution as expected by Kenyans. Jubilee government seems to want to stagger it for three more years,” said Mr Rutto.

The Bomet governor, at the same time, accused the government of trying to renege on some of the devolved systems of government it had initially committed itself to as it was taking back the management of roads back to the national government.

“We have heard Deputy President William Ruto several times talking about lack of capacity in the counties and that they want to build capacities in the county governments but they are not telling us how long they are going to do that,” he said.

Mr Rutto argued that if indeed there is no capacities in the county governments, it is an indictment on the national government because it should have built the capacities in the last 50 years.

Build capacity

“If they failed to build capacity in the last 50 years, then what business do they have trying to tell us that they are trying to build capacities in six months or one year?” he said.

Mr Rutto maintained that the county governments have the necessary capacities.

“The counties have executive officers in place who are competent and we are in the process of recruiting county chief officers, county and sub-county administrators as well as ward administrators. We have given them the tools and we want to move on properly and swiftly as governors to deliver services to wananchi as we only have four years to do that,” he said.

Rutto said the governors were not ready to wait on a government that was not committed to devolution.

He said the move by President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy to retain former provincial commissioners whose titles became redundant after the March 4 General Election was another indicator that the government was not committed to devolution.