Deputy
President William Ruto has dismissed the three-tier system of governance that Opposition leader Raila Odinga proposed during the Devolution Conference.
Ruto said the
magic of devolution is in service delivery and that this is what Kenya needs.
"That is what our people want," he said during the closing ceremony on Thursday.
"Rearranging devolution cannot
be by creating another layer. It should
be by taking the counties
to the wards. We cannot take
devolution upwards. [It should be taken] downwards. That is where
devolution has to go and we don't have to change the Constitution
for that."
Ruto has over the last three weeks been opposed to anything that may lead to Kenyans being taken to a referendum ahead of the next election.
But people around Raila and President Uhuru Kenyatta are pushing for this including changing the current Presidential system of government.
Some see the move as aimed at undermining Ruto's 2022 Presidential bid.
The Deputy President also said:
"The Chinese say a bad workman quarrels with his tools. If you are a bad workman, you will find all manner of excuses - blame the Constitution, MCAs or Senators. We built the SGR and didn't need to amend the Constitution. It's all about being focused.
"If somebody is bad workman he will blame counties ... because he is a bad workman."
Ruto further noted that Kenya has many issues to deal with without engaging
in a billion-shilling referendum.
Raila, a former Prime Minister, proposed expansion of the current devolved structure of government.
The ODM leader told the conference that Kenya should now adopt three tiers of government, a proposal that was shelved before the 2010 referendum.
"As a matter of lasting solutions to the problem posed by sizes of devolved units, we need to bite the bullet and revisit the structure of devolution," he said on Wednesday.
"The Bomas Draft divided Kenya into 14 regions. It is time to look at how to recover this original spirit.. My proposal is to adopt a three-tier system of government."
Raila said Kenya should
retain the current counties but establish
14 regional or provincial blocks as units of disbursement of resources and the national government.
Related: