Members of Migori County Assembly (MCA’s) unanimously passed the Sh8.8 billion Budget Estimate for the Financial Year 2021/2022 contained in the Budget and Appropriation Committee Report, which was tabled in a special sitting of the assembly.
The Report that was tabled by the Budget and Appropriation Committee Chairman Thomas Akungo before the presiding speaker MCA for North Kamagambo Ward Mr. George Omamba.
County Assembly, Health and Medical Department and Roads, Transport and Public Works were the biggest winners from the budget having received an allocation of shs 1.8billion, shs 1.5billion and shs1.1billion respectively.
However the losers of the budget that received small allocations included Environment, Natural Resources and Disaster Management, Trade and Tourism department and County Attorney’s office.
Each of these departments received an amount of shs2.3million, shs 1.6million and shs90.5miliion respectively.
The overall County Government Development Budget is shs 2.9 billion (34%), a total recurrent of shs 5.8billion (66%), a total operations budget of shs 2.9billion (34%) and a total of shs 2.8billion (33%) budget for county operations.
However the allocation of 90.5million to the County Attorney’s office raised a lot of concern among the MCAs who did not see the need for that office as the county has been running without any.
A section of Migori county MCAs also rejected the 2021/22 budget report presented to the county assembly by the chairman of budget approximation committee who questioned the reduction of allocations from County executive committee to the county assembly.
Speaking to Kenya News Agency after the budget approval, MCAs led by Member of County Assembly for Ntimaru East Ward Mr. Augustine Mwise faulted the report claiming they breached the constitution by passing some sections of the budget which he deemed to be unconstitutional.
The same sentiments were echoed by Central Kanyamkago Alex Jaoko Akugo who faulted continued allocation of funds to committees every financial year and is never used prudently by the said committees.
He said that the committees operate without any money but at the end of the year the assembly accounts are always empty and nobody is ready to account for where the money went to.