Kajiado assembly speaker Johnson Osoi will now write to his Senate counterpart to explain why the county's budget-making process was delayed for a month.
This is after the MCAs gave the executive Sh11.2 billion, with the house slashing the executive’s budget by Sh210 million.
The MCAs slashed monies for newspapers, tea, lunches and 20 new cars, saying in the last financial year only 11 per cent of development projects were initiated.
Osoi, as the law requires, will explain to the Senate why the budget was delayed beyond June 29 so that Speaker Kenneth Lusaka can write to the National Treasury to release the county's equitable share.
The total resource envelope has grown by 12.2 per cent from the 2020-21 budget. The executive has attributed this to the additional Sh1.5 billion revenue received from an equitable share from the national government.
Budget committee chairman Henry Kimiti said this year’s budget is higher than that of the previous year by Sh9.4 billion.
Kimiti said ever since the inception of devolution in 2013, Kajiado has never realised its source-revenue targets despite the county being ranked among the top in potential.
“With the proper mechanism in place, local revenue can finance close to 60 per cent of the budget,” Kimiti said.
He said the performance from July to May 2020-21 was 45 per cent, the amount collected was Sh766.7 million against a target of Sh1.68 billion.
He attributed the 50 per cent underperformance in revenue collection to measures by the county government to cushion businesses from the fallout from Covid-19.
The implemented intervention measures include removal of market/barter fees, slaughter fee and bus park fees.
The chairman said equitable share received during the same period was Sh4.83 billion compared to an expected target of Sh6.42 billion, which represents 75 per cent performance.
“This indicated that there was delayed reimbursement of Sh1.59 billion from the national government,” the chairman said.
"Total grants received amounted to Sh509.2 million against a target of Sh1.58 billion representing 32 per cent performance."
(Edited by Bilha Makokha)
