Garissa allocates Sh2bn to growth

The Garissa government has allocated Sh2.5 billion to development out of the Sh8.6 billion 2019-20 budget.

While reading the budget statement at the county assembly on Thursday, Finance executive Roble Nuno defended the move, saying this was within the required Public Financial Management fiscal responsibility requirement of allocating 30 per cent of the budget to development.

Of the cash allocated to development, 23 per cent translating to Sh600 million, has been allocated to what the county finance officer said was ward-based development budgeting, which was adopted by the county assembly. The money, he said, is to finance ‘most pressing needs’ in the county.

Nuno blamed low funding for development on huge wage bill, saying the county government has recruited many workers in the health department.

The executive told the county assembly they have reduced their revenue collection target from Sh250 million to Sh150 million this year since they did not realise their expected revenue in previous years, leading to deficits and pending bills.

“As a county, we are working with acceptable revenue automation systems to cut pilferage and increase our revenue collection in the future,” Nuno said.

The county finance officer said the county administration is planning to register more than 10,000 plots to raise at least Sh26 million in land rates.

He told ward representatives that the county administration has improved water coverage from 25 per cent to 85 per cent in Garissa Township.

On health, the official said they are intending to purchase six basic life-saving ambulances, construct a modern cancer centre at the county referral hospital and ensure the renal and ICU units in the referral hospital are operational.

On agriculture, the county government has launched a mass livestock vaccination targeting one million livestock.

“Renovation and refurbishment of four subcounty livestock offices and fodder production and conservation was done with regional pastoral livelihood resilience project where 65 acres of range reseeding was done in Balich Olgojo farm,” he said.

---