• While these are the Constitutional mandates of the Treasury, the office of the Controller of Budget has only four key functions.
• The CoB also has a mandate to advice Parliament on issues related to transfer of funds to State organs or any other public entities.
Image: EZEKIEL AMING'A
Last week, the office of the Controller of Budget made damning allegations on how former Treasury and National Planning CS Ukur Yatani pressured her into releasing Sh15 billion in just a matter of minutes.
While appearing before a parliamentary committee, the CoB went ahead to release a print of what appeared to be a printout of an alleged WhatsApp conversation between her and the former CS.
The former CS in a rejoinder told off the Controller of Budget Margaret Nyakang’o for making false and malicious allegations against him.
Yatani denied that he had pressured her to make unauthorized payments during his time in office and described the claims as “false, malicious and actionable in law”.
He went on to cite Article 223 of the Constitution, which he said allowed him to authorise expenditures not appropriated by Parliament when need be.
To this point, one might be wondering if the two offices, while one looks more powerful than the other, are linked.
In the Constitution of Kenya, Treasury CS has specific functions it handles, among them; formulation, implementation and monitoring of macro-economic policies involving expenditure and revenue, and managing the level and composition of national public debt, national guarantees and other financial obligations of the national government.
Treasury also prepares the National Budget, implements it and also controls all approved budgetary resources to Ministries, Departments and Agencies, as well as all other government entities.
It also mobilises domestic and external resources for financing national and county government budgetary requirements, as well as design and prescribe an efficient financial management system for the national and county governments to ensure transparent financial management and standard financial reporting, and preparing the annual Division of Revenue Bill and the County Allocation of Revenue Bill.
The Treasury also formulates, evaluates and promotes economic and financial policies that facilitate social and economic development, in addition to developing policies for the establishment, management, operation and winding up of public funds.
While these are the Constitutional mandates of the Treasury, the office of the Controller of Budget has only four key functions.
They include; Overseeing the implementation of the budgets of the National and County Governments by authorising withdrawal from public funds.
The Office also prepares, publishes and publicizes statutory reports, conducts investigations based on their own initiative or on a complaint made by a member of the public, and conducts alternative dispute resolution mechanisms to resolve disputes.
The CoB also has the mandate to advise Parliament on issues related to the transfer of funds to State organs or any other public entities.
From the above, it is clear that the CoB’s office is there to ensure that Treasury is accountable for any public funds approved to undertake a project. This happens by the Treasury seeking clearance to transfer any public funds from CoB.
The Controller of Budget draws her powers from Article 228 of the Constitution of Kenya, 2010.