Kitui county government has asked MCAs to approve a Sh100 million supplementary budget to buy drugs and sort out other urgent needs in the health and sanitation department.
In the Sh11.3 billion supplementary budget proposal presented to the county assembly, Governor Charity Ngilu’s administration wants the health allocation for 2019-20 increased from Sh3.3 billion to Sh3.4 billion.
On Wednesday, county assembly's budget and appropriations committee chairman Boniface Kilaa said the proposal had been received from the county treasury and had been submitted to his committee for consideration and recommendation.
“We need to interrogate the document as a matter of urgency due to the current dire state of our health facilities. There is a serious drug shortage and patients have no food and other provisions,” Kilaa said.
He said the committee was on a retreat to consider the supplementary budget.
"We will work around the clock to ensure we present our report to the assembly latest by Wednesday next week for approval or otherwise."
The executive has proposed that allocations for the finance department, lands and infrastructure and trade and cooperatives be slashed by Sh40 million, Sh20.7 million and Sh20 million respectively.
The funds will be used to plug the hole in the health department's budget.
Another Sh16.9 million will be slashed from the department of education and Sh2 from the governor's office while the department of culture and tourism will get an increase of Sh1 million.
The supplementary budget proposal if approved will see the county's recurrent budget adjusted from Sh6.1 billion to Sh6.3 billion for 2019-20 financial year. The development budget will reduce from Sh4.2 billion to Sh4 billion.
edited by peter obuya
