President William Ruto has ordered the transfer of all budgets and resources for devolved functions still held by the national government starting July next year.
This as the Head of State said his administration was working to ensure counties receive Exchequer releases on time, admitting delays in disbursing funds to county governments.
The development comes after the President directed the Intergovernmental Relations Technical Committee (IGRTC) to commence the identification and transfer of the budgetary allocations for the unbundled functions.
Speaking at the State House on Monday, the Head of State pledged to complete the transfer of all the remaining functions without delay.
The move comes after he revealed that the committee had finalised the unbundling, delineation, and transfer of the said functions and the same will be gazetted on Friday, December 20.
The national government had in January last year committed to gazette all remaining unbundled devolved functions before March this year.
In December 2023, President Ruto gave the Department of Devolution and IGRTC two months to document and transfer all the devolved functions still held by the national government to the 47 devolved units.
The president further said that consultations were underway to ensure that the remaining devolved functions still held by ministries, departments, and agencies are all transferred.
In the Kenya Kwanza manifesto, Dr Ruto promised to complete the transfer of all functions constitutionally earmarked as devolved functions to counties within six months.
Recently, the national government transferred library and museum functions to some 33 county governments.
“I am pleased to report that the Intergovernmental Relations Technical Committee has finalised the unbundling, delineation, and transfer of functions in line with my directive during our last Summit,” said President Ruto after chairing the 11th National and County Government Coordination Summit.
“I now direct the committee to take the next step of systematically identifying and transferring the requisite budgetary and other resources tied to these functions in the next fiscal year,” he added.
In August 2023, an IGRTC report on the transfer of pending devolved functions revealed that the national government was performing various elements of at least 10 decentralised functions totalling Sh272.2 billion.
The report showed that the affected ministries included the Ministry of Health and agencies under it, which are still performing 45 elements of health functions that exclusively belong to the counties.
The Ministry of Water has 18 elements, while in the Education Ministry, 52 elements were identified and unbundled as exclusive to the county governments.
Other affected ministries are Roads and Transport with 51 elements, Agriculture with 41 elements, Energy with four elements, Trade with 19 elements, and 11 elements held by the Tourism and Wildlife Ministries.
The committee has been involved in the unbundling exercise since last year, with the process also involving the costing of the functions, staff to be impacted by the transfers and payroll costs, resources deployment, and budget rationalisation summary as well as assets to be transferred.
Besides the functions and the budgets, multi-agency technical task teams established by IGRTC to guide the final unbundling processes also identified assets, policies, and laws that will be amended to streamline the transfer.
In line with the latest directive, the president called on all ministries, departments, and agencies at both levels of government to hasten the dispute resolution processes by taking advantage of alternative resolution mechanisms.
He noted that the approach not only saves time and averts costly delays, but also relieves citizens of the financial burden of legal fees and fosters mutual trust and collaboration.
“I am encouraged to note that many disputes are now being referred to the IGRTC for resolution, and I applaud their efforts in preventing disagreements from escalating into disputes,” he said.
While the president acknowledged that the two levels of government were distinct, he said they are also interdependent and it is in the same spirit that there are ongoing collaborative efforts between the two levels.
He cited the national government’s support for county-led initiatives like school feeding and bursary programmes, as well as classroom expansion projects.
Similarly, Dr Ruto said counties have partnered with the national government on fresh produce market infrastructure projects.
At the same time, the president acknowledged concerns regarding the disruptions caused by delays in disbursing funds to county governments.
He said that the intermittent flow of resources, especially conditional grants and development funds, to counties, had undermined the ability of county governments to effectively support the implementation of strategic national programmes and complementary county projects.
Nonetheless, he said the situation had been occasioned by constraints within Kenya’s national fiscal framework, resulting in an inability to fully meet county governments’ expectations for shareable revenue.
The Head of State said the challenge should not be mistaken for a lack of commitment to devolution but rather as a temporary difficulty arising from inherited fiscal vulnerabilities and the incomplete implementation of devolution.
“It is deeply regrettable that our overall development and service delivery outcomes would likely have been much different under a more favourable fiscal environment. We are taking effective measures to address these issues, and our resolve to consolidate and deepen devolution remains strong,” said Dr Ruto.
“I must emphasise that devolution is not just a policy or administrative tool; it embodies the fundamental aspirations of our citizens, is a foundational principle of our nationhood, an essential constitutional value, and a transformative pillar of governance. For these reasons, devolution is here to stay,” he added.
