A Nakuru Member of County Assembly has called on President Uhuru Kenyatta to intervene and help county governments clear debts they inherited from the defunct municipal and town councils.
Lake View ward MCA Karanja Mburu says the counties are facing problems emanating from the huge debts they inherited from the defunct local councils.
“It will only be fair if the national government finds a way of helping counties pay the bills,” he said.
Nakuru County inherited close to Sh 1 billion in debts that were owed to creditors, suppliers and government agencies by the defunct Nakuru municipal council.
While lauding the directive by President Kenyatta on pending bills, Mburu said it will be hard for counties to clear all their pending bills amounting to billions if the national government doesn’t step in to rescue the situation.
According to the MCA, development within counties has been stalled due to the huge amount of money going to clearing pending bills and settling recurrent expenditures.
The lawmaker called on counties to strike a balance between recurrent and development expenditure if the spirit of devolution is to be realized.
“The main aim of devolution was for the people to see and feel real development on the ground but that will not be realized if we continue spending all the money on recurrent expenditure,” he said.
He, however, called on counties to restructure their local revenue collection systems with the aim of sealing the loopholes being used to siphon the little that is collected.