Editor's Review

“I would go for a maximum of 14 because if you look at Rift Valley, it was like two-three provinces combined and also the Eastern province. Even 8 would still serve us perfectly well." 

Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi has proposed the reduction of counties saying they are unsustainable due to the huge wage bill.

Speaking during an interview on Wednesday, March 19, Mbadi suggested that Kenya should revert to 8 counties like in the previous constitution or have a maximum of 14.

He pointed out that counties have a lot of staff and the national government is struggling to pay their salaries.

“If You go to counties, you will find all kinds of staff, you find directors of fishermen, boda bodas, music, culture directors earning big salaries. We have so many people and again, that is notwithstanding the fact that 47 counties are just too much for our country.

“47 counties each one of them with a full-fledged government, a governor who is the mini president with a deputy who is running mate, and struggling to find work to do, and then you have ministers, all of them went for 10 which is the maximum then you have Chief Officers and county assemblies,” said Mbadi.

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File image of Treasury CS John Mbadi. 

The Treasury CS opined that scaling down the number of counties will address the country’s financial crisis and ensure that resources reach the grassroots.

“I would go for a maximum of 14 because if you look at Rift Valley, it was like two-three provinces combined and also the Eastern province. Even 8 would still serve us perfectly well, with the devolution of resources going to the grassroots. We can devolve resources without devolving the heavy government to the grassroots,” Mbadi remarked.

Further, CS Mbadi mentioned that the government spends Ksh 960 billion of the Ksh 2.5 trillion collected from taxes in a year to pay salaries.

He said the government also spends about Ksh1.1 trillion on loan repayment and less money remains for development.

“Today we are paying 80 billion per month at the national government level for salaries. Per year it is 960 billion and we are collecting 2.5 trillion and we are spending on loan repayment about 1.1 trillion so where do you get money for development?” he posed.