Governors tell off Uhuru over empty pledge

By ROSELYNE OBALA and GEOFFREY MOSOKU

Kenya: Governors have differed with President Uhuru Kenyatta’s remarks during his State of the Nation address that his government has fully devolved functions as per the Constitution.

“The President in his speech talked of his support for devolution yet in action, the central government is still stuck with some of these functions such as roads,” said Council of Governors (COG) chairman Isaac Ruto.

They censured the Jubilee administration over failure to fully devolve functions to counties and allocation of 14.7 per cent of the internal generated revenue. This has been the basis for their push for a referendum to increase the percentage to 45.

President Kenyatta said his government had increased county allocation from the stipulated 15 per cent to 32 per cent.

The county bosses criticised the proposed vertical distribution of national raised resources based on shareable revenue amounting to Sh1.026 trillion, of which the National Assembly Budget committee proposed Sh217.87 billion. The National Government is supposed to retain Sh808.44 billion, including Rural Electrification Authority and Sh3.5 billion Equalisation Fund.

Governors Evans Kidero (Nairobi) and William Kabogo (Kaimbu) noted that Sh217.87 billion proposed as counties equitable share, which translates to 32 per cent of the 2011/2012 audited resources is not satisfactory.

“In the last allocation, counties received 14.7 per cent of the national revenue contrary to the Government’s argument that it was 23 per cent,” said Dr Kidero.

He also noted some functions devolved to counties are still with the National Government, including staff. “What we want is at least a minimum of Sh238 billion up from the Sh190 billion equitable allocation for last year,” said Kabogo.

National allocation

Wajir Governor Ahmed Abdullahi Mohammed explained that the fund should exclude level five hospitals and donor grants, which amounted to Sh20 billion in the Division of Revenue Allocation 2013/2014.

 “There is the cost of administration, devolved functions and pensions. All these need money to execute. It is a danger if counties are starved of funds,” warned Kidero, who is also the vice chair of COG.

 He explained that national allocation should also be based on population, poverty index and area instead of only the share between the two levels of governments.

The governors argued that functions under various ministries such as Roads, Environment, Devolution, Agriculture, Health, Energy, and Mining among others are yet to be devolved.

 According to Ruto who is also the Bomet Governor, the National Government is also plotting to return health services to Nairobi following a report tabled in the National Assembly that seeks to rescind the devolution of health services until proper systems are put in place. “Energy is fully devolved, some aspects of agriculture, which include irrigation are still with the National Government,” noted Ruto.

The county chiefs have noted that attempts by the Government to interfere with the devolution conference in Kwale is an indicator that it is not committed to support devolution, contrary to President Kenyatta’s continuous pledge.

But yesterday, Transport and Infrastructure Cabinet Secretary Michael Kamau told off the governors over the roads issue, stating that he will not engage them in the media. He said they should instead go to his office if they have any complaints. “Who has prevented governors from constructing roads in their areas,” he questioned.

 Senate report

However, Senate devolution chairman Kipchumba Murkomen has insisted that all functions have been devolved to counties as stipulated in law. “We have devolved all the functions and the Senate report will be tabled in the House next week,” said Murkomen, in defence of the President, adding: “The allocation will go with all the functions.”

The law assigns functions of roads to both governments with the National Government being in charge of national trunk roads while counties will administer all other roads referred to as county roads. 

Transition Authority Chairman Kinuthia Wamwangi when contacted by The Standard on phone, confirmed that not all functions have been devolved.

Additional reporting by Faith Ronoh