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{
"id": 1058099,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1058099/?format=api",
"text_counter": 302,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. (Eng.) Hargura",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 827,
"legal_name": "Godana Hargura",
"slug": "godana-hargura"
},
"content": "Madam Deputy Speaker, for this particular Report, Financial Year 2014/2015, which was the second year of devolution, there are issues which are clearly not being taken up by the county governments in terms of getting into management of public resources. Unfortunately, they are still recurring. If you look at the past reports that were tabled by the CPAIC, which went up to 2017/2018, the same issues are still recurring. Among the issues, which are in this Report is not adhering to the budgets. Counties have approved budgets, which are approved by the county assembly. However, when the governors are implementing their budget, you will find that they expend outside the budget. Items which have not been approved in the budget are found to be undertaken and funds allocated to them. That is operating outside the budget, and it is occurring almost across the counties. The requirement would have been that if there is any change or priorities, then the executive should submit the budget back to the county assembly through a supplementary budget and have a new budget approved, so that they can implement the new activities, which have become a priority along the way. However, that has not been done. Another area which has been highlighted by this Report, and is still recurring, is pending bills. Counties have incurred pending bills. By the first financial year of devolution, counties had pending bills of Kshs62.8 billion. However, by the second year, which is now being addressed by this Report, the pending bills have increased to Kshs108.9 billion. Therefore, the issue is: What is the source of these pending bills? One source has been addressed in these reports as being under-collection of their own source revenue. Counties set their own targets when they are budgeting. For example, a county will say that in this financial year they have a target of Kshs200 million to raise as own source revenue, but they do not meet that target, and that is what has been put in the budget. If they raise Kshs100 million, it will automatically mean that they will have Kshs100 million under-sourced in their budget, and if items are expended, that means that that Kshs100 million will be pending bill. However, that is not enough because that is not only where they are generating the pending bills. There is the issue of undertaking works or expenditure, which has not been approved in the budget. That will become a pending bill because it was not budgeted for. Under normal circumstances, you will find that the national Government could be generating pending bills because their funds lapse at the end of the financial year. However, in the case of the county governments, it does not lapse. Whatever has been approved under the County Allocation Revenue (CARA) here, will have to be delivered to the counties by the National Treasury. If the year lapses and there are some outstanding funds, it is normally carried forward as pending bills and re-budgeted. Whatever was not paid for in the previous year should be dealt with in the subsequent year. It should recur in the subsequent year."
}