House committee faults State over Sh16b unapproved spending

A National Assembly committee has criticised President William Ruto government for tabling supplementary estimates two weeks before the close of the financial year, saying some of the expenditure will not be realised.

The Budget and Appropriations Committee (BAC) chaired by Kiharu MP Ndindi Nyoro (pictured) also took issue with the Executive for spending Sh16.3 billion over and above the current budget that is ending on June 30 without seeking approval of the National Assembly.

The move came after the National Treasury presented a mini budget to the National Assembly for approval last week after it made adjustments to various votes and programmes that saw some of the programmes exceeding the 10 per cent threshold allowed by the Constitution.

Article 223(5) of the Constitution allows the government to withdraw money from the Contingencies Fund and seek the approval of Parliament for any spending under it within two months after the first withdrawal of the money.

In a report, the committee said there was no justification and evidence of the money spent in line with provisions of the standing order 243(2c).

Informed judgement

According to the committee, without the critical information required, the National Assembly would not be in a position to make informed judgement on the rationality of the expenditure.

The committee also regretted that out of the Sh16.3 billion approved, only Sh4.1 billion had been disbursed.

Reads the report: “This further implies that the National Assembly may only be able to approve expenditure whose money had already been spent and evidence provided and not what was approved. This is in accordance with the Standing Orders and resolution of the House during the consideration of supplementary estimates 1 for the financial year 2022-2023.”

Flood control

According to the National Treasury, the Sh16.3 billion comprised Sh5.1 billion for recurrent expenditures of which Sh3.8 billion is on account of providing additional resources towards Junior Secondary School capitation while the remainder of the money was to pay for bills after Kenya Hosted UN habitat Assembly.

The remaining Sh11.3 billion under development expenditure was mainly for Water Storage and flood control programme –Thwake dam (Sh49 billion), Road Transport Programme Sh2 billion, National Referral and Specialised Services Programme Sh579 million, Water Resources Management Sh752 million and Water and Sewerage Infrastructure Development Sh800 million.

The committee at the same time also took issue with the Executive over its decisions to reduce allocation to the State department for Correctional Services, the Ministry of Defence, State department for Interior and the Department for Housing, saying this would have a negative impact on ongoing projects.

This is after the House approved the supplementary estimates that will see the recurrent expenditures in the 2022/23 budget increase by Sh9.5 billion while the development budget decreased by Sh34.97 Billion.