MCAs reallocate Ksh 300m meant for salaries for health workers

Kirinyaga Governor Ann Waiguru has hit out at the MCAs for reallocating Ksh 300 million meant for salaries for health workers to construction of ward offices.

Waiguru now wants the Senate, the Controller of Budget and the Jubilee Party leadership to intervene and save the County from grinding into a halt.

This after an impasse on the approval of the County budget heightened after the County Assembly made wholesome changes to the budget.

“This is completely unacceptable given that the health workers have put their lives on the line in fight against the COVID-19 pandemic and that it would further put the lives of Kirinyaga residents in danger for not being able to access health services,” She said.

The Assembly further removed Ksh 20 million meant for payment of casual workers’ wages as well as Ksh 14.6 million for fuel for ambulances, water bills and oxygen for our hospitals, which the Governor says is likely to paralyzing operations in the critical health sector.

The Assembly instead of approving the budget, submitted a completely new budget with a variation of over 30% per vote, and which the Governor says, “goes against the requirement of Regulation 37(1) of the Public Finance (County Government) Regulations 2015 which limits the assembly variations to 1% of the ceilings.”

In a statement, the Governor further states that the Assembly removed Ksh 50M allocated for conditional matching funds which effectively means that about 68,000 coffee farmers from Kirinyaga will not benefit from the program which includes access to Cherry Advance Revolving Fund.

This she says an initiative under the Presidential program on coffee revitalization where the County was required to raise Ksh 100 million.

Waiguru says the Assembly also removed Ksh 184 million allocated as conditional matching funds for donor funded programs under Health, Agriculture and Education.

“These funds were already signed for between National Government and Donors and as a county we are expected to provide the matching funds if we are to benefit. The action by the assembly means that these projects will not be carried out in Kirinyaga. This will affect over 3,000 farmers, over 7,000 youth in our polytechnics and residents who require health services,” She said.

She accuses the Assembly of interfering with the County statutory obligations by removing Ksh 58 million meant for payment of taxes to the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA).

The Assembly also removed Ksh 59 Million meant for the County Attorney office which will hamper the County Governments efforts to pursue pending cases on land recovery as well as a further Ksh 30 million meant for payment of pending bills.

Waiguru says all these alterations on the budget are in contravention of a Presidential directive especially on pending bills.

She has therefore vowed not to approve the specific alterations to the budget and urged the MCAs to put the needs of the Kirinyaga people first.