Tana River senator Danson Mungatana has called out Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi over what he terms a skewed allocation of resources which hurts county governments.

Speaking on Tuesday, March 18, 2025, at the senate, Mungatana observed that while the budget policy statement which was signed by President William Ruto indicated that there will be a 10 per cent growth in revenue, there was no corresponding allocation to counties.

“The budget policy statement estimates that there will be a growth of revenue by about 10 per cent (259 billion). The surprising thing is that there is no correspondent growth in the allocation that is supposed to go into the county governments,” Mungatana stated.

“(Mbadi) should not go there and be surrounded by people who think it was a mistake to create county governments. I want to remind Mbadi that he himself intended to run for a county position as governor. As he sits there, he should rearrange the people serving there. We need people who are pro-devolution.”

The legislator equally called for two separate treasuries with one dedicated to serving the national government and another one for counties.

“The National Treasury seems to be working only for the National government; because surely if the revenue is rising by 10 per cent, the logical thing then is that county governments should expect a 10 per cent increment,” he observed.

“When you look at that Treasury, it is not friendly to devolution, treasury thinks that our County Assembly Forum should not be given any more money; the treasury thinks that the devolution family is a drain on the treasury. They don’t think that it is an investment to follow funds with investments in this country,” Mungatana added.

Reconstitution of Treasury staff

He reprimanded the allocation of resources to counties as skewed, noting that the staff at Treasury should be rearranged and populated with pro-devolution individuals.

“They think it is better to add more money to security and international relations but they don’t think it is important to send money to the devolution family. We must call out the treasury for what it is.”

“We need to deliberately populate that Treasury with people who think devolution is important. That treasury needs to be drained. The workers there think that counties are not important and are a nuisance. You cannot devolve functions and then you don’t release the money for governors to execute those functions,” Mungatana noted.