Government to reorganise State offices in bid to cut costs, improve public access

President William Ruto

The government has announced plans to reorganise the location of State offices across the country in a major efficiency drive aimed at bringing public services closer to citizens.

Head of Public Service Felix Koskei on Wednesday said the move will also be one of the austerity measures to save taxpayers billions of shillings spent on office rent.

The proposal emerged on Wednesday in Nairobi during a meeting of the government Chief of Staff and Principal Secretaries across State ministries where the officials also reviewed reforms touching on payroll management, food security, the turnaround strategy at Kenya Airways among others.

Speaking after the meeting, Koskei said the government was reassessing how ministries, departments and agencies occupy office space to eliminate costly leases and make government services more accessible to Kenyans.

"We discussed issues of optimisation of office accommodation across government, trying to save on leases and trying to really think hard on how we can reorganise government office locations so that not only will they be accessible to the citizens of this country, but also we save on excess and expensive leases from other landlords," he said.

He said the restructuring forms part of a wider public sector reform agenda intended to improve efficiency while directing more public resources towards development programmes.

"We are doing all this to ensure that efficiency and effectiveness in government is seen to be rolled out so that the government will focus more on the citizens and on things that will accelerate the development of the country," he added.

The planned reorganisation comes as the government faces mounting pressure to reduce recurrent expenditure, particularly the huge amounts spent annually on renting office space for State agencies despite the existence of several government-owned buildings.

Koskei said the meeting also received updates on efforts to clean up the government's payroll system following concerns over manipulation and inaccurate personnel records.

Latest government audit revealed that taxpayers lose about Sh60 billion to irregular salary payments.

Earlier this year, the government announced that the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) had launched investigations into suspected payroll fraud as part of efforts to dismantle networks behind fictitious employees and recover lost public funds.

According to Koskei, presentations by the Public Service Ministry, the Internal Auditor General, the National Treasury and the Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS) management showed significant progress in securing the payroll database.

"We are satisfied with the progress that has been made in cleaning up the payroll and making sure that those who are paid are those who are working in government and those who are really serving the people of Kenya," he said.

The accounting officers also reviewed Kenya Airways' turnaround strategy, with Koskei expressing confidence that the national carrier's board had presented a credible recovery plan.

"We were satisfied with the board's proposal and we have confidence with the board because we realised that it is the right board which, of course, will turn around Kenya Airways," he said.

On agriculture, he lauded the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organisation (KALRO) for strengthening agricultural research, farmer advisory services and climate-resilient farming technologies.

He said KALRO's research on improved seed varieties, livestock genetics and farmer data collection would play a critical role in enhancing food production despite the challenges posed by climate change.

While acknowledging that prolonged drought had resulted in crop failure in some parts of the country, Koskei maintained that the government had put in place interventions to cushion both farmers and consumers.

"We may have less than normal harvest, but government has taken steps to ensure that farmers are taken care of as well as the consumers in the market," he said.