Public participation empowers people to seek genuine growth

Nyeri residents air the concerns during a public participation forum on the plan to impeach Deputy President on October 4, 2024.[Kibata Kihu, Standard]

In her book ‘The Challenge for Africa, 2004,’ Nobel laureate and environmentalist Prof Wangari Maathai used the traditional African three-legged stool as a metaphor for what she views as the three components of a stable society: sustainable environmental management, democratic governance and a culture of peace.

Drawing from Prof Maathai’s analogy, let me focus on the second leg - democratic governance - through the lens of county governments. Importantly, public participation is not only a right but also a core value and principle essential to promoting good governance at the county level.

Article 6 of the Constitution creates a decentralised system of government with the primary goal of devolving power, resources and representation to the local level. It is noteworthy that the Constitution identifies county governments as the appropriate level to entrench and ensure public participation in governance.

Indeed, one of the functions allocated to the county governments is stipulated under Section 14 , Part 2 of the Fourth Schedule: ensuring and coordinating the participation of communities and locations in governance at the local level and assisting communities and locations in developing administrative capacity for effective exercise of functions and powers and participation in governance at the local level.

The County Government Act (Cap 265), Public Finance Management Act (Cap 412A), and the Urban Areas and Cities Act (Cap 275) emphasize participation in a number of governance areas, including public finance management, planning, performance management, development of policies and legislations, implementation of the Bill of Rights and service delivery. 

Public participation improves accountability, it enables the public to own both the process and the product. Public participation plays a critical role in promoting democratic governance. Notably, public participation ensures inclusivity and transparency in governance making county governments more responsive to the citizens’ needs.

Although county governments have made significant strides in enhancing meaningful public participation, including but not limited to the development and enactment of laws on public participation, there remains no overarching legislation to clarify what constitutes adequate participation.

In the absence of a substantive law on public participation, attention has been shifted towards the courts for interpretation of the concept. The most exhaustive discussion on public participation was done in the case of Joseph Enock Aura vs. Cabinet Secretary, Ministry of Health & 13 Others, Constitutional Petition Number E473 of 2023 in the High Court of Kenya at Nairobi.

In pronouncing itself on the importance of public participation, the court outlined what it called the “bare minimum” requirements for public participation. Most of these are familiar ones - adequate notice, actively facilitating participation, inclusivity, diversity, and transparency. Significantly, the court held that before a technical exercise of public participation commences, there is an affirmative obligation to conduct public sensitisation.

Ultimately, public participation is fundamental to realising the concept of democracy as a government of the people, by the people, for the people as famously put by US President Abraham Lincoln in his Gettysburg Address of November 19, 1863.

The writer is CEO of the Council of Governors