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Devolution: Win for counties as national government transfers all immovable assets
President William Ruto, Governor Gladys Wanga, (left) Council of Governors Chair Ahmed Abdullahi (left), Vice Chair Mutahi Kahiga (2nd right), Senate Speaker Amason Kingi (2nd left), Governor Joshua Sang (extreme left) and PS Devolution Michael Lenasalon (extreme right) unveil the Council of Governors (COG) Devolution Institute Manual during the opening of the Devolution Conference, 2025 at Homabay National School, Homabay County
The national government has transferred all immovable assets, including land and buildings, due to counties, ending 12 years of wait by the devolved units, marking a major boost for county governments.
The development follows gazettement of the immovable assets by President William Ruto on Tuesday, August 12, 2025.
Speaking during the official opening of the 2025 Devolution Conference in Homa Bay, President Ruto said 50,000 parcels of land and 80,000 buildings have been transferred to the counties from the national government.
"We have gazetted all the immovable assets on August 12, 2025, a process that has eluded us for the last 12 years. What has been gazetted include 50,000 pieces of land and 80,000 buildings," said President Ruto.
The latest move comes after senators chided the intergovernmental relations technical committee (IGRTC) calling it “toothless”, amid a long wait by counties to have devolved assets transferred to them.
The legislators said they will now take it upon themselves to engage the national government to expedite the transfer of assets worth billions of shillings from the national government to the devolved units.
The development follows complaints by governors that they are yet to receive devolved assets from the national government despite the IGRTC charged with working on the transfer of both movable and immovable assets.
Since the passage of the 2010 Constitution, finalisation and transfer of assets relating to the defunct local authorities and those attached to the devolved function have remained pending for a long time.
Senate County Public Investments and Special Funds chairperson Godfrey Osotsi said the delays in the transfer of the fixed assets is turning into a huge concern with Auditor-General Nancy Gathungu fingering counties over non-maintenance of fixed assets register.
The Vihiga senator said the agency has done little as far as the transfers of the fixed assets are concerned only transferring some old or condemned movable assets like motorcycles while the other valuable assets are yet to be transferred.
He asked the governors to either approach the Senate or the Intergovernmental Budget and Economic council or the Summit to ensure that all the assets for devolved functions still held by the national government are transferred.
“We are concerned about IGRTC on transfer of assets. IGRTC is proving to be toothless on this matter. As the Council of Governors, you need to look for another way of dealing with this matter,” said the ODM Deputy Party leader.
“This committee is going to take the matter up because IGRTC has been sleeping on its job as far as the transfer of assets is concerned,” he added.
Elgeyo Marakwet Senator William Kisang said the Senate needs to speak to the matter in the form of a resolution which will then become law.
“We need to come up with a motion to give the National Treasury a period of time to transfer the assets it is holding because this will continue to be an audit query for eternity,” said Mr Kisang.
“We can give them six months to act on the resolution and make sure they transfer the remaining assets due for transfer to the counties,” he added.
In May 2024, Devolution Principal Secretary Teresia Mbaika announced that the IGRTC had handed over movable assets, which initially belonged to defunct local authorities, to the county governments worth Sh3 billion.
She stated the over 8,000 movable assets spread across all the 47 counties included plant, motor vehicles, and equipment, completed in August 2023.
The total motor vehicles owned by the defunct local authorities were 2,617 with 1,755 motor vehicles serviceable and 838 grounded.
They included saloon cars, lorries, vans, motorbikes, pick-ups, tractors, boats, ferries, combined harvesters, ambulances and trucks.
Ms Mbaika added that the valuation of the movable assets was already complete with the report already handed over.
The PS, however, said the valuation of fixed assets, land, and buildings is still work in progress, and plans are underway to complete the pending works.
The lands owned by the defunct local authorities, which was categorised as public land, included (but was not limited) to land meant for offices for municipal, town and county councils as well as those for social amenities like stadiums, recreational parks, and bus parks.
Others are for schools, slaughter houses, market centers, health centers, access roads, game reserves and parks. The total parcels of land of the 175 defunct local authorities were 62,342 parcels.
Out of the number, 3,106 parcels had some disputes varying from irregular or illegal allocation, undefined boundaries or demarcations, grabbing and encroachment.
The buildings owned by the defunct local authorities include county and town halls and offices, social amenities such as social halls, schools, market stalls or sheds, health centers, and public toilets.
Others are slaughterhouses, bus parks, cattle dips, mortuaries, housing estates or residential units with the total number of buildings identified, verified and validated standing at 8,461.
There were 160 buildings reported to have disputes including illegal and irregular allocation or illegal occupation of public land.
