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Mombasa Governor Hassan Joho risks impeachment for running the County without a cabinet, a move Mombasa-based advocate Yusuf Abubakar says is unconstitutional.

Currently, the county government is operating without County Executive Committee Members (CECMs) whose contracts expired on November 12, 2019.

The Cabinet constituting 10 CECM were serving on a contract of two years from November 13, 2017 handed over their offices to their respective chief officers immediately on expiry.

Further, the county does not have a county public service board after the term of previous members expired a year ago, thus making it hard to hire staff.

To complicate the matter, the employment contracts for chief officers who have been in charge of departments since exit of the former CECs is also set to expire on January 31. Legal experts say the count government is in shambles and is not fully constituted.

According to lawyer Abubakar, a cabinet is a mandatory constitutional requirement for there to be a complete county government, and therefore, governor Joho is currently riding on an illegality.

“A county government is constituted when we have the executive and the County Assembly. The executive is comprised of the governor and the county executive committee. Failure to appoint the Cabinet is therefore a violation of the Constitution,” said the lawyer.

Ground for impeachment

The above, the lawyer says, is enough ground for impeachment of a governor as espoused in Article 181 Section One (a) on removal of the governor for gross violation of the Constitution of Kenya, 2010.

According to Abubakar, the Constitution obligates the county government to serve the people and, therefore, failure to appoint the Cabinet will impact negatively on the service delivery.

“So Members of the County Assembly have the mandate under the County Government Act to impeach the governor on that basis. If that is not possible because of political considerations, the President has been given another leeway. 

He has the power to suspend the county government in case of constitutional violation and appoint a county government to run that county. So it is upon the County Assembly and the President to act,” said the lawyer.

Regarding the argument that the Constitution is not explicit on the time frame required, he said the law talks of “a reasonable period of time” which members of the public can seek interpretation.

Contracts of about 400 enforcement officers also expired last month without being renewed because there is no board in place to undertake recruitment or sign new ones.

Mombasa residents gave mixed reactions in regards to the situation in the county with some arguing the state could expose county residents to spate of crisis.

Shortage of drugs

“Suppose there is a cholera outbreak, who will handle the crisis? For example the issue of shortage of drugs at the Coast Provincial General Hospital and the issue of garbage strewn all over is a serious one and without a cabinet this is a recipe for more chaos,” said Mohammed Gedi,  a Tononoka resident.

Another resident, Raphael Odieny Wakaya from Ziwa la Ng’ombe urged the governor to appoint a new cabinet as quickly as possible to avert further crisis in the county.

But sources within the county government are of the view that the governor could be in a silent attempt to cut cost of running the county because of shortage of funds.

 Contacted, the County Chief of Staff who is the acting secretary Job Tumbo, however, said there is no cause for alarm as county operations are running uninterrupted.

“I can tell you for a fact that there is no crisis in the county at all. All county businesses are going on as usual. There is no cause for alarm, after all there is no stipulated timeframe within which the governor should appoint the Cabinet after the contracts expire, so let us give him time,” Tumbo said.