Friday, 21 March, 2025
The Finance and Budget Committee considers the County Governments Additional Allocations Bill 2025๐๐๐ซ๐ฅ๐ข๐๐ฆ๐๐ง๐ญ ๐๐ฎ๐ข๐ฅ๐๐ข๐ง๐ ๐ฌ๐๐ก๐ฎ๐ซ๐ฌ๐๐๐ฒ, ๐๐๐ญ๐ก ๐๐๐ซ๐๐ก ๐๐๐๐
The Finance and Budget Committee met today to consider the County Governments Additional Allocations Bill, 2025 (Senate Bills No. 1 of 2025).
This development comes after the Bill was published on 6th February 2025, read a First Time on Tuesday 4th March 2025 and, thereafter, committed to the Standing Committee on Finance and Budget for consideration, facilitation of public participation, and subsequent presentation of a report to the House.
The County Governments Additional Allocations Bill, 2025 provides for the transfer of conditional and unconditional allocations from the National Government's share of Revenue and from development partners to the county governments for the financial year 2024/25.
These additional allocations to counties are provided for under Article 202(2) of the Constitution, where it is stipulated that County governments may be given additional allocations from the national governmentโs share of the revenue to enable them to perform their functions adequately.
While considering the contents of the Bill at Parliament Buildings earlier today, the Members of the Mandera Senator Ali Roba led Committee were pleased to learn that the Bill proposes to allocate Ksh.60.2 billion as additional allocations to County Governments.
They, however, noted with concern that the Bill is being considered and processed three months to the end of the financial year and expressed fears that the delay in the enactment of the Bill will result in non-disbursement of the full allocations.
โWe are approaching April and the Financial Year is almost ending. If we allocate any additional funds in this Bill, it means that we will go to mediation and this thing is going to drag and the donor funding is going to flop,โ Senator Ali Roba, the Chairperson of the Committee, said.
Senators resolved to publish the Bill ahead of time to ensure counties get resources to construct their county headquarters and avoid the general competitive nature of expenditures towards the end of the financial year.
The County Governments Additional Allocation Bill allocates Ksh.523.1 million to support the construction of county headquarters offices in Isiolo, Lamu, Tana River and Tharaka Nithi Counties.
The Bill also provides for an allocation of Ksh.1.759 billion for the settlement of salary arrears for County Government Health Workers within the 2024/2025 financial year.
The National Government through the Ministry of Health and the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU) executed a Return-to-Work Agreement in March 2024, which saw the end of the Doctors' industrial action.