Counties lack trained staff, says Budget chief

Lack of trained finance officers is hampering budget preparation in counties.

Most of the devolved governments have employed Finance staff, who do not know how to prepare budgets, leading to dismissal of their proposals by the Controller of Budget.

In a report tabled in the Senate, the Controller of Budget says some of the devolved governments were yet to employ enough finance officers.

“The majority of counties have inadequate human capacity to prepare and implement the budget,” says the Budget chief. This has resulted in preparation of budgets with deficit and non-implementation of development projects in the first quarter, the report said.

The counties where chief officers were yet to be appointed have been most affected in budget implementation, according to the report.

All the counties have to furnish the Budget office with acceptable proposals on how to spend the billions of shillings allocated to them.

CONTAINING ERRORS

Without the office’s approval, no money can be released by the National Treasury to a county government.

The devolved units have been preparing proposals containing errors and which surpass their budgets.

According to the Budget office, preparation of procurement plans, especially for development projects has been delayed.

Further expenditure returns with errors and other inconsistencies were forwarded for approval.

Over-targeting of revenue collection was also among the challenges, the report said.

Senators adopted the report, which was tabled by the chairman of the Committee on Devolved Government, Mr Kipchumba Murkomen, last Thursday.

Garissa, Kajiado and Isiolo counties failed to meet their revenue targets due to inadequate collection personnel, the Controller noted.

“The human capacity and necessary systems are not yet in place to facilitate collection of revenue,” the report said.

That has revenue collection lower than targets, adversely affecting budget implementation, according to the report.