Devolution came with an aim of bringing services close to people, as well as fasten key development projects, but is it working?
Have services moved close to people? Are development projects at their pick in “Mashinani’?Well, Key County development programmes might just soon stall owing to the tough financial conditions that are expected to worsen going into the next financial year.
Treasury has announced a Sh9 billion cut on county allocations, dealing a blow to the devolved units, some of which are yet to roll out any meaningful development projects.
Council of Governors chairman Wycliffe Oparanya told a local daily that counties could be compelled to run ‘recurrent expenditure only budget’ and drop development programmes, if the biting cash crunch persists.
Apart from the looming budgetary cuts, counties are also grappling with local revenue shortfalls, which is believed to be fuelled by corruption
“The fact of the matter is that programmes and projects in the counties will be affected if the resources will go down,” Oparanya said.
“First, there are essential services that must be given priority like health. Salaries must also be paid. So if you pay salaries and you cannot fire, then we will definitely have counties running recurrent expenditure without substantial amount to run the development aspect of the budget.”
Nearly all the 47 counties are currently facing serious cash flow challenges because of the dwindling internal revenues, delays in the release of funds from the National Treasury, corruption and other wastages.