Mombasa collects Sh1.6 billion in three months

The Mombasa government collected 1.6 billion in revenue in the first quarter of 2023, a report seen by the Star from the county finance department shows.

The revenue department collected Sh270,132,327 in January, the amount rose to Sh510,261,367 in February and in March the figure was up to Sh792,863,010.

This summed up to Sh1,573,256,704 for the first three months of 2023.

Last year, Mombasa collected Sh498,998,855 in January, and in February the figure went down to 479,635,817 and in March the amount collected was Sh515,926,400.

For the first quarter of 2022, Mombasa collected Sh1,494,561, 072.

The revenue collection for this year improved by Sh78,695,632, translating to 5 per cent rise.

Last month, Governor Abdulswamad Nassir extended the waiver period for paying land rates and annual single business permit fees to April 30.

The waiver period had initially been set to March 31.

In March, Mombasa collected Sh214,185,237 from land rates, compared to last year’s Sh192,536,564 in the same period, which translates to a 10 per cent increment.

Even as counties continue to grapple with inadequate funding from the National Treasury, Nassir has said this will not stop them from delivering services to residents.

He said his administration will continue to work on improving own source revenue.

“We need to stand on our own so that we do not have people dictate to us what to do, we want to tell them (national government) even if they continue denying us funds from the National Treasury, Mombasa will grow,” Nassir said last week.

According to the governor, the business community in Mombasa has faith in his administration and has pledged to continue paying all the required county rates.

“After looking closely at the revenue collected, it is clear that the people of Mombasa have faith in this administration and they have faith in our programmes,” Nassir said.

Last September 26, just 11 days after he was sworn into office, Nassir announced changes aimed at streamlining revenue collection in the county.

He removed all inspectorate officers from all revenue collection points, including Miritini, Mariakani, Shanzu and Likoni cess stations.

The county chief said they had established a new team of Mombasa revenue enforcement officers who were deployed at all revenue collection points to replace the county inspectorate officers.

The governor also removed all inspectorate officers deployed in markets and the parking unit. They were redeployed to carry out traffic and security enhancement duties.

A few weeks after the changes, Nassir said they had been able to improve revenue collection in the region.

He said they had improved revenue collection by at least 70 per cent at all the cess points and all the parking areas in Mombasa.

The county is collecting in excess of Sh1.3 million from the three cess points daily.

In county parking fees, Nassir said, the level of compliance among PSVs owners was initially below 30 per cent.

“If we are able to raise the compliance rate to 100 per cent in all the departments, then Mombasa will be collecting enough to fund its operations,” he said.

According to Nassir, out of the Sh6 billion Mombasa receives from the national government, 83 per cent goes to paying salaries.

However, over the last four months, counties have not received their equitable share from the national government amounting to Sh96 billion.

Nassir said the delays undermine devolution.

“Despite well-formulated guidelines in the disbursement of these monies, we are witnessing a subversion of devolution through systematic under-allocation of funds. In recent weeks, the country has seen a deliberate effort to frustrate the fair and equitable share of revenue to the devolved units,” he said.

Last week, while in Nairobi, Nassir met with Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi over the critical issues undermining devolution.

“County governments are grappling with the effects of delayed disbursement of funds, thus crippling operations and curtailing service delivery,” Nassir told Mudavadi.