MERU, Kenya, April 27 – The Commission on Revenue Allocation (CRA) has pleaded with county governments to improve their own revenue sources to meet their needs as well as develop marginalized areas.
Speaking in Meru County during public participation in the 13 marginalized areas identified by the commission, CRA Commissioner Isabel Waiyaki said the counties have the potential to raise more of their own revenue that can benefit their own marginalized areas.
“When all counties depend on the national cake, then it becomes a bit hard because they can raise much more for the benefit of the marginalized areas as well as their own unique development projects,” said Waiyaki.
Beyond what they are getting from the national government as the equitable share, she added, the county government of Meru, for instance, can raise Sh3 billion but has been raising Sh316 million, which has improved this year to about Sh400 million.
She, however, applauded the Meru County government for the improvement, adding that they were making efforts to raise their own source of revenue.
“If you look at all the counties, currently from their own source revenue, they are only raising about Sh35 Billion but they have the potential to raise Sh216 Billion,” said Waiyaki, adding that if the governments can meet the target, then CRA can wean off some of the counties from the equitable share as they collect own revenue.
She said the commission was working with the counties to help them automate their processes and was also coming up with an integrated county revenue management system that will standardize revenue collection.
“So far, we are happy with what Meru County is doing in terms of its own source revenue and we are fully behind them,” she said.
She said they were conducting public participation in the identified areas to confirm the data they have and that which is on the ground.
The County Deputy Governor, Revered Isaac Mutuma, expressed their gratitude to the commission for picking the 13 areas to benefit from the fund, but said there were more such areas in the county that needed to be considered for the fund.
“We pray that CRA will consider additional areas because climate change has really affected the County and especially areas that were historically thought to be food secure but at the moment are not and they therefore need support through such initiatives,” said Mutuma.
He said marginalization usually occurs as a result of certain systems that are there, and this is what they were fighting for as a county by distributing resources and serving the people equally.
Some of the areas identified include Nginyo and Kachiuru sublocations in Igembe North, Nkiene and Antuambui in Igembe South, and Kiambogo sublocation in Tigania East, among others.
