County cash sharing plan ‘to aid poor areas’

The Commission on Revenue Allocation has defended the formula it used to share funds among counties saying it sought to address regional disparities.

Speaking in West Pokot, commissioner Joseph Kimaru said the formula focused on population of regions as opposed to land mass to find a lasting solution to economic challenges facing residents.

Economical challenges

“This formula is aimed at addressing key economic issues which are unique to every county with a view of ensuring equity in resource allocation across the nation,” noted Prof Kimaru.

The commission in April recommended that county governments be allocated Sh203 billion and Sh407 billion be given to the national government.

However, some MPs opposed the proposed allocation, saying it favoured economically-endowed regions.

They asked the commission to review the formula to include factors such as poverty, geographical features and climatic conditions.

They vowed to shoot down the proposals in Parliament if these factors were not considered.

While acknowledging that the proposed funds were not sufficient to address the challenges in marginalised regions, Prof Kimaru said the Equalisation Fund would address this.

“We recommended that the Equalisation Fund which will be 0.5 per cent of the national Budget be disbursed from the 2013-2014 financial year when the county governments will be in place to address these issues,” he said.

Meanwhile, the commission has admitted that the population data used to come up with the proposed allocations might not be realistic since they relied on the 2009 census data.