Assemblies are misusing budgets: report
PHOTO | KEVIN ODIT | FILE A county assembly in session. Members of county assemblies risk losing their seats if they do not adhere to an Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission code of conduct.s (MCAs) are sacrificing county budgets for development on the altar of political expediency.
What you need to know:
- A report prepared by the commission says that the legislators moved quickly to take charge of the budget process, thereby adversely affecting county development plans to launch multi-million-shilling projects for the benefit of all regions.
The Commission for the Implementation of the Constitution (CIC) has warned that Members of County Assemblies (MCAs) are sacrificing county budgets for development on the altar of political expediency.
The committee says that MCAs have openly sought to have projects they favour put in the budget and that they are also influencing the exclusion of some projects deemed to be favourable to areas where they got fewer votes in elections.
A report prepared by the commission says that the legislators moved quickly to take charge of the budget process, thereby adversely affecting county development plans to launch multi-million-shilling projects for the benefit of all regions.
For instance, the Nakuru County Assembly pushed for the inclusion of a Sh110 million ward development fund and proposed a further five per cent allocation from the county budget for education bursaries.
“All budgets should be based on county plans not political manifestoes,” CIC’s report into the first year of devolution says.
“For MCAs, they could include their ‘good’ manifestos into county plans they so wished to be captured in the budget.”
