Counties spent Sh63b on salaries and travels

Governors Evans Kidero, Kinuthia Mbugua and Hassan Joho’s county governments spent more than Sh10 billion on personnel emoluments in six months.

During the same period, Governors Okoth Obado, Ukur Yattani and Moses Lenolkulal’s governments led other counties in spending Sh506.7 million on Members of County Assemblies (MCAs) sitting allowances.

Further, Dr Kidero, Mr Mbugua and Kenneth Lusaka’s governments reported the highest expenditure on domestic and foreign travel, totalling Sh673.3 million.

The Government's Budget Implementation Review Report (CBIRR) for the first half of 2015/16 financial year report reveals that county assemblies spent a total of Sh63.28 billion on personnel emoluments, domestic and foreign travel and MCAs’ sitting allowances.

According to Agnes Odhiambo, the Controller of Budget (CoB) 56.33 billion was spent on personnel emoluments, Sh4.58 billion was spent on domestic and foreign travel and Sh1.37 billion on MCAs’ sitting allowances during the period July to December 2015.

The sitting allowances translate to 38.2 per cent of the approved annual budget allocation compared to 18.4 per cent attained in the similar period of 2014/15.

County Assemblies that reported the highest expenditure on sitting allowances relative to the number of MCAs and the Speaker were Marsabit at Sh1.07 million, followed by Migori at Sh988,362 and Samburu at Sh979,328.

Marsabit has 34 MCAs and the report shows that each pocketed Sh178,600 average monthly sitting allowance while 63 MCAs in Migori received Sh164,700. Twenty six MCAs in Samburu each got Sh163,200.

Those that reported the least expenditure were Baringo at Sh300,248, Tharaka Nithi at Sh245,459 and Vihiga at Sh109,580.

Each of the 49 MCAs in Baringo received an average monthly sitting allowance of Sh50,000, while their 40 counterparts in Vihiga pocketed Sh18,000 each. Each of the 25 MCAs in Tharaka Nithi got Sh40,000.

According to the report, county assemblies that reported the highest proportion of expenditure on MCAs’ sitting allowances to the annual budget allocation were Makueni at 69.6 per cent, Kisii at 66.7 per cent and Samburu at 55.9 per cent.

Those with the lowest proportions were Tana River at 20 per cent, Tharaka Nithi at 17.6 per cent and Murang’a at 12 per cent.

Twelve county assemblies exceeded the recommended Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC’s) maximum monthly sitting allowance of Sh124,800.

They are Homa Bay, Kakamega, Kericho, Kisii, Kisumu, Marsabit, Migori, Mombasa, Nyeri, Samburu, Trans Nzoia and West Pokot.

The counties’ aggregate expenditure on domestic and foreign travel was Sh4.58 billion against an approved annual budget of Sh10.55 billion. This represents an absorption rate of 43.5 per cent of the annual budget, a marginal decrease from 43.7 per cent attained in the first half of 2014/15 financial year.

Nairobi reported the highest expenditure on domestic and foreign travel at Sh286.99 million followed by Nakuru and Bungoma at Sh197.30 million and Sh188.99 million respectively. Thecounties that reported the lowest expenditure were Mandera, Narok and Kwale at Sh33.14 million, Sh14.97 million and Sh12.46 million respectively.

Favourite foreign destinations for ‘benchmarking trips’ for MCAs include India, Singapore, China, Switzerland, Israel and Dubai.

In Africa, the MCAs frequent Uganda, Rwanda and South Africa while Mombasa is the favourite local destination for the county leaders.

Bomet had the highest proportion of domestic and foreign travel as a proportion of its approved annual budget at 107.6 per cent followed by Trans Nzoia at 94.5 per cent, Homa Bay at 93.7 per cent and Bungoma at 85.2 per cent.

On the other hand, Kajiado at 19.6 per cent, Mombasa at 17.4 per cent, Mandera at 13.6 per cent and Kwale County at 6.8 per cent had the lowest proportion of expenditure on domestic and foreign travels.

During the same period, counties spent Sh56.33 billion on personnel emoluments, translating to 49.7 per cent of total county governments’ expenditure, compared to 46.8 per cent spentin a similar period of 2014/15. Nairobi reported the highest expenditure on personnel emoluments at Sh6.68 billion followed by Nakuru at Sh2.38 billion and Mombasa at Sh2.06 billion.

This is the second report for the 2015/16, and it presents the status of budget implementation by the county governments, and analyses both revenue and expenditure performance.