Survey shows counties now more transparent with budgets
Kiambu MCAs exchange blows after differences emerged during the tabling of the supplementary budget on March 21, 2019. A new survey shows that counties are becoming more compliant in budget transparency by providing the public with the necessary information. PHOTO | ERIC WAINAINA | NATION MEDIA GROUP
What you need to know:
- Laikipia and West Pokot came a close second, publishing six out of the seven documents.
- Kenya County Budget Transparency Survey reveals continuous improvement by the counties.
- County Budget Review Outlook Papers were the second most published documents.
County governments are becoming more compliant in budget transparency by providing the public with the necessary budget information, a report has shown.
The Kenya County Budget Transparency Survey reveals continuous improvement by the devolved units, which is determined by the availability of key fiscal and budget-related documents on county websites.
The March 2019 average transparency score increased to 32 percent from 10 percent in the March 2018 study, also conducted by International Budget Partnership (IBP) Kenya.
TOP COUNTY
Elgeyo Marakwet is the top county in terms of budget transparency, publishing all the seven documents that were assessed in the March 2019 survey.
Laikipia and West Pokot came a close second, publishing six out of the seven documents.
Kitui published five documents while Baringo, Makueni, Marsabit, Nyeri, and Vihiga had four budget documents each.
Bomet, Garissa, Kirinyaga, Kisumu, Lamu, Migori and Wajir did not publish any of the documents that were under assessment as required by the Public Finance Management Act, 2012.
IBP surveys official county government websites to assess key county budget documents that should have been made available to the public while formulating and implementing the budget, in accordance with the Public Finance Management (PFM) Act, 2012.
KEY DOCUMENTS
“These key documents should have been released during the formulation of the 2019/20 and implementation of the 2018/19 county budgets. These are documents that were to be published between July 1, 2018 and January 31, 2019,” said Mr John Kinuthia, the lead research analyst at IBP.
“There is a notable increase in the number of county budget implementation reports that were found online in this round, though there is a long way to go,” he said.
The PFM Act sets the annual development plan as the document that anchors county annual budgets. Some 30 counties had ADPs for 2019/20 online.
ACTUAL PERFORMANCE
County Budget Review Outlook Papers, which review the performance of actual budget implementation during the previous fiscal year, were the second most published documents with 26 published in the final assessment in March, a significant increase from just eight that were published online in 2017.
And in the Approved Program-Based Budget, which gives the public an opportunity to see how the county assembly amended the proposed budget during the approval process, a total of 11 counties had their approved documents for the financial year 2018/19 published online.
