Kiambu's 92 MCAs gobbling up Sh 11 million each for maintenance

Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu. [Standard]

The County assembly has been spending Sh1 billion annually to maintain offices for its 92 MCAs, a new report has revealed.

A report tabled in the assembly by the Budget and Appropriation Committee on the county’s 2019/20 budget showed each of the ward representatives gobbled up Sh11 million for office maintenance in past financial years.

Assembly clerk Joseph Igogo, who appeared before the committee last week, defended the figures, saying they were the lowest compared to other counties'.

"The cost of maintaining one MCA in Kiambu in one year is Sh11 million while the cost of maintaining one MCA in Lamu is Sh22 million,” said Mr Igogo.

He noted that as a result of under-funding of the Kiambu MCAs, in comparison to their colleagues nationally, they were unable to ensure implementation of key projects contained in the 2019 County Fiscal Strategy Paper.

Despite the alarm raised on the hefty maintenance figures, the MCAs became the biggest beneficiaries of the budget passed last week.

In the Sh15.6 billion budget that they unanimously approved, the 60 elected MCAs will get more than Sh77 million, translating to Sh108,000 per month for their ward office expenses.

The leaders will also be spending Sh8 million for foreign travel in the 2019/20 financial year.

The 32 nominated MCAs, on the other hand, got Sh14 million. All the 60 wards have also been allocated Sh120 million for rehabilitation of roads.

At least 65 per cent of the total budget, representing Sh10.1 billion, will go to recurrent expenditure.

Only Sh5.4 billion, representing 35 per cent of the budget, will go to development.

The budget will be funded by a Sh9.2 billion allocation from the national government, conditional grants amounting to Sh3.4 billion, and the rest from county revenue sources.