The report shows the county executive has a budget of Sh36,128,627,977 while assembly’s is Sh3,485,288,302. Sh10,101,494,012 from the executive’s budget is earmarked for development initiatives while Sh26,027,133,965 is set for recurrent vote.
The assembly on the other hand, has a total budget of Sh3,485,288,302, with Sh1,861,000,000 earmarked for development expenditure and Sh1,624,288,302 set for recurrent expenses.
The report show that out of out of the Sh379,489,884 the assembly has so far received, Sh303,802,414 was used for paying salaries and allowances to its staff for the first half of the current financial year 2022-23. Sh75,687,470 was used for operations and maintenance.
Not a coin has so far gone to development initiatives in the assembly.
The county’s development programmes is vested with the county’s executive.
However, the assembly is expected to dedicate part of the resources it receives from the exchequer to develop its systems, including modernising its operation, making its proceedings and output more accessible, and improving its infrastructure to accommodate the MCAs and the press.
The MCAs do not have offices and spaces at the assembly, except for some of the members of the core leadership team.
But the CoB report shows the assembly did not dedicate a cent for the renovation of its facilities nor any development works.
“….the County Assembly spent Sh303.80 million on employee compensation and Sh75.69 million on operations and maintenance,” the report says, raising concern of a bloated workforce.
The report also shows the assembly has so far spent Sh12.88 million on committee sitting allowances for the 124 MCAs and the Speaker against the annual budget allocation of Sh68.21 million.
The average monthly sitting allowance was Sh17,308 per MCA. The Assembly has 26 committees.
The problem of underspending in development was cutting across the two arms of the county administration.
The report also says the Governor Johnson Sakaja-led executive for spending a only Sh927 million on development out of the Sh10 billion it has so far received from its county account withdrawals.
It also raises concern over the devolved unit’s wage bill which is devouring much of the budget.
“During the reporting period, expenditure on employees’ compensation was Sh.7.08 billion, or 83.0 per cent of the revenue for the first half of FY 2022-23 of Sh.11.55 billion. This expenditure remained at Sh7.08 billion as reported in a similar period of FY 2021-22. The wage bill included Sh.3.09 billion paid to health sector employees, translating to 43.7 per cent of the total wage bill,” the report says.
Moreover, the report has also flagged the assembly for dedicating much of the funds to travel, with its domestic travel expenses raking up much of the funds for the whole county.
Specifically, the report says, "Expenditure on domestic travel [for the whole county] amounted to Sh86.63 million and comprised Sh59.05 million spent by the county Assembly and Sh27.58 million by the county Executive."
But the executive dwarfs the assembly in the foreign travels column, raking up Sh30 million out of the total of Sh31 million dedicated for the vote.
"Expenditure on foreign travel amounted to Sh31.70 million and comprised Sh1 million by the Assembly and Sh30.70 million by the Executive."
(Edited by V. Graham)
