Press Release

Press Release: Executive, Parliament and County Governments Must Reason Together

Nairobi, February 24, 2014/…International Center for Policy and Conflict is urging the Executive, Parliament and County Governments to respect and mutually engage each other constructively through creating trust, understanding and foresight partnership.

National government and County government are two parts of a whole governance system and not competing entities. Both are critical engines for building a more productive, competitive economy and providing better public services.

Devolution is about fostering efficient, responsive, transparent and accountable governance at all levels. Its purpose is to reduce poverty by strengthening local governance and supporting sustainable local economic development.

Parliament and County governments play critical mutually reinforcing roles in linking citizens with government, and in ensuring broad-based and democratic ownership of development and governance policy.

The national institutions namely Executive and Parliament (Senate and National Assembly) are constitutionally required to provide a better enabling environment for County Governments to pursue local sustainable economic development while improving the prospects for local communities.

County governments require the right environment and technical support to produce important job creation and economic results for women and men, and improve the governance environment to support economic development locally.

If there were serious accounting, tendering and procurement problems as outlined in the Auditor-General interim report, the appropriate procedure was to table the report in the respective County Assembly for interrogation and investigation including summoning the responsible officers. This is consistent with Article 226(2) of the Constitution that requires an accounting officer of any public entity at the County level account to County Assembly for financial management.

We specifically recommend that both national and County governments:

1. Establish an essential element to the partnership of strong and frequent lines of communication and the use of multi-sectoral team-based approaches to resolve intergovernmental and Institutional disputes

2. Create appropriate, coordinated and effective measures to enhance the institutional competencies and capacities of County Governments so as to improve on transparency, accountability and public participation

3. Enhance the fiscal transfer system, institutionalize accountability mechanisms, improve financial management and establish effective monitoring systems

4. Strengthen and engage in open planning and budgeting and publicly disclose information about audits, plans, budgets, tendering and procurement

5. Create tough safeguards against corruption