• Governor wants counties to receive part of revenue from parks that occupy 62 per cent of county.
• Balala says managing wildlife requires more resources that a county cannot handle.
Image: FILE
Tourism Cabinet Secretary Najib Balala has asked Taita Taveta Governor Granton Samboja to drop his push to have Tsavo National Park converted to a game reserve.
He said running the park is too expensive for the county and handing over the expansive twin park to the county is a threat to the conservancy.
Balala was reacting after Samboja moved to the High Court to compel the state to share revenue collected from Tsavo East and West national parks and their subsequent conversion to a game reserve.
"We are saddened by Samboja's move to go to court. He should have consulted other parties to understand the best way forward," Balala said.
The CS said wildlife management would require more resources. "The cost of running Kenya Wildlife Service is Sh8 billion while the revenue collected is Sh4 billion. This means the extra Sh4 billion comes from the Treasury. No single county has the capacity to manage that."
Samboja says Taita Taveta community does not receive benefits from wildlife despite the two parks occupying 62 per cent of the total county landmass.
The governor wants the county government to be allowed to start collecting revenue from the parks.
He said residents have continually suffered from the conflict despite the government earning billions from wildlife.
Most parts of the county have experienced perennial human-wildlife conflict resulting in deaths, destruction of property and injuries.
Balala further disclosed that wildlife generates at least 70 per cent of the Sh150 billion generated from tourism annually. The generated revenue, he said, is channelled to Consolidated fund which is later shared to counties.
He argued that communities benefit from the allocation from the national government and that there's no provision for any revenue to be directly submitted to Taita Taveta.
"We cannot give a direct benefit from Tsavo National Park to the communities. The conservancy happened to be a national park in 1946, so these are the structures we have inherited," he said.
In May, Taita Taveta county assembly passed a motion seeking to push KWS to remit to the county at least 30 per cent of the over Sh60 billion collected annually from Tsavo.
However, Balala asked Samboja to borrow a leaf from other counties that are struggling to manage national reserves.
There is also a dilemma on how the revenue would be divided among the counties bordering Tsavo if the park is converted into a game reserve.
Apart from Taita Taveta, Tsavo also borders Kitui, Makueni, Kilifi, Kwale, Tana River and Kajiado counties. Almost all the seven counties have asked for a cut from the park.
Edited by R.Wamochie