Image: HILTON OTENYO
The government of Kakamega has announced plans to seal loopholes in revenue collection to meet its targets from local sources.
Kakamega County Revenue Agency CEO Chris Okumu yesterday said one of the measures is replacement of the current revenue collection gadgets.
“The agency has imported 300 automated revenue collection gadgets, currently being synchronised to make them tamperproof so as to attain our targets for the financial year 2023-2024,” Okumu said.
The gadgets are meant to phase out use of receipts, which are susceptible to editing by unscrupulous revenue officers to deny the county revenue.
The county targets to collect Sh2.4 billion this financial year, up from Sh1.2 billion in the 2022-2023.
Okumu said Kakamega has the potential to collect up to Sh5.8 billion from own sources annually.
“The machines will be connected to our main revenue system where we will be able to monitor all payments being made through the new gadgets. It will be difficult to edit or manipulate any payment or transactions and that will help us to seal all leakages and improve on our collection,” he said.
Okumu said the machines will soon be deployed to various trading and revenue collection centres, especially in disputed areas like in Likuyani and Lugari constituencies where the county shares borders and some of the trading centres with Uasin Gishu and Bungoma counties.
He said that revenue officers will be trained to handle the new gadgets to ensure efficiency.
Okumu said the revenue agency is focusing on leading revenue streams including health, liquor businesses, markets and land rates to raise revenue before the close of the financial year.
“We have discovered that with proper mechanisms and modern equipment, we will be able to get more revenue in our health facilities, from those doing liquor business, land rates, outdoor advertisements, royalties from mining and markets, and that will enable us achieve our revenue collection target,” he said.
The government rolled out an ambitious plan in October 2023 to boost own source revenue by establishing the office of the county valuer under the Kakamega County Valuation and Rating Bill, 2023 to boost land rates collection to Sh500 million from Sh24 million per year.