Growing up, there was a boy who was notoriously mischievous and had a reputation of poetic insults with unmatched capacity to cause hurt.
He was, therefore, feared by his peers and slightly older children because he was also reckless in choosing his targets.
His schooling ended prematurely due to his indiscipline and the absence of parental enforcement. I never heard nor thought of him for many years until some time back when I saw the antics of someone who was very much like him at a ward-level political rally: this person’s task is to entertain the audience and make them receptive to the rallies.
Kenyan politics has evolved to a point where such people are very much needed by politicians, and often rewarded with jobs they have not qualified for.
Counties generally have two categories of expenditure; recurrent and development expenditures. Recurrent is a regular spending on ongoing operational functions and is aimed at ensuring continuity of services.
Development is spending on defined projects or investment with an aim of creating or improving as asset and enhancing economic and social development.
To finance both expenditures the counties get funds from equitable share of revenue raised nationally from the exchequer, conditional grants from agencies running programmes with the county and from revenue raised within the county – own source revenue.
Invariably, most counties surpass legal percentages of recurrent expenditure to the detriment of development which is required to be a minimum of 30 per cent.
Why is this? The first reason is immediate political gain. With the prevailing high levels of unemployment, a job is a lifeline, a means for a citizen to face the next day.
To the politicians, it is a means to accrue political support with the lowest hanging fruit being employment. Employment of a member of a household is considered to secure at least five votes, while the loss of employment could easily confi rm the loss of more than 10 votes.
Fifty-three per cent of the total expenditure of Mombasa county is spent on employee’s compensation – salaries and allowances, leaving 17 per cent for development.
The amount spent on development is estimated at Sh2 billion, while that spent on employees compensation is Sh6.8 billion.
The second reason is the administration’s priorities, which may be
misplaced or not well conceptualised.
The need for legacy building is often the cause of such skewed priorities. In the case of Mombasa county, Office of the Controller of Budget says not only is the development budget 17 per cent of total expenditure but only 43 per cent of the budget was used.
The need to reward supporters and government functionaries can also influence the scheduling of expenditure. The expenditure on travel to Turkey for a seminar on artificial intelligence that costs approximately 10 per cent of the cost of the revenue management system, may seem more like a joyride with no deliverables.
The last reason I can think of is the uncertainty that revolves around long-term projects. The main disincentives include significant initial investment, long gestation period and vagaries of political expediency.
To maintain political dominance, impatient voters must be appeased with some benefits even as they continue to wait skeptically for comprehensive life-changing outcomes.
To mitigate or manage investments, some counties have formed invested agencies to promote strategic development.
Mombasa county’s Mombasa Investment Corporation whose mandate is to attract and facilitate investment within the county cost the taxpayer Sh8 million, mostly in employees compensation annually, despite none but one of the projects advertised being tentatively underway.
There is no doubt there is massive room for improvement, but with most elected leaders having at least three potentially formidable competitors willing to take them on at every turn, only a remarkable leader able to quell impatience.
