The move by the National Treasury to continue withholding Budgetary allocations to counties is derailing delivery of services to the residents.
The Marsabit Deputy Governor (DG), Solomon Gubo said the edict about pending bills had also occasioned the delay of salaries for county government workers for the month of January.
Speaking to the press on Monday soon after signing the condolence book for the late former President Moi at the county commissioner’s offices, Gubo said the situation has greatly constrained most of development projects.
The DG said the devolved unit has Sh.300 million worth of pending bills owed to contractors and assured employees that they would be paid their salaries this week.
“The National Treasury has disbursed some funds meant for recurrent expenditure and I am assuring our hard working employees that they will be paid their delayed salaries this week,” he said.
He said that strategic plans to guide the operations of various departments and make continuous progress toward sustaining activities have been rolled out.
Gubo added that the executive was holding consultations with the County Assembly on how best the issue of pending bills could be solved.
He also disclosed that discussions with the Controller of Budget were on-going in a bid to streamline the matter and to convince the National Treasury to release the funds to the county.
The DG also called on the National Treasury to soften on the demands regarding pending bills to enable the counties to clear their debts with ease.
Gubo said grievances by suppliers were being addressed and appealed to them to be patient.
Last month, Governor Mohamud Ali disclosed that his administration had managed to pay Sh.600 million in pending bills out of the genuine Sh.900 million.
The governor had expressed his government’s commitment to comply with the National Treasury’s directive on pending bills, adding that in-depth reconciliation of financial and procurement records was in progress.
Governor Ali said that he had ordered an audit concerning a debt of Sh.1.1 billion reportedly owed to contractors which revealed that a claim of Sh.200 million to be fake.
By Sebastian Miriti
