COUNTIES FROM THE COAST TO BENEFIT FROM GOOD GOVERNANCE PROJECT

Mombasa, Kilifi and Tana River are amongst the beneficiary counties to
a 116 million project that seeks to raise the capacity of the County
Governance Systems in Kenya.

The European Union and German Embassy backed project at the same time
aims at raising public awareness on how to participate in governance.

 During the launch that happened in Nairobi Mombasa Senator Hassan
Omar called for leaders to involve citizens on issues affecting them
directly.

‘It is unconstitutional to ignore citizens in development projects as
this goes against the spirit of devolution.The people could be the
ones offering solutions to their challenges since they understand
their problems better. Good governance ensures participatory measures
on the leader’s side to ensure all voices are heard,’ continues Omar.

Mombasa Women Representative Mishi Said has scolded those in
leadership positions who overlook citizen’s input saying that some
proposals made by the people are altered before they reach the floor
of Parliament.

‘We have the Community Land Bill and there was a taskforce formed to
work on this Bill. There was a lot of stakeholder meetings and people
their voices on this document.It is unfortunate that the Bill does not
reflect the people’s opinions in terms of land issues. There is need
to offer capacity building to the citizens,’ says Mishi.

The German Deputy Ambassador Friedo Sielemann noted that devolution
should be used to strengthen democracy and development as citizens are
provided with platforms to influence the quality of development at the
county level.

‘There is need to go beyond Civic Education to a more citizen
inclusive approach. The use of scorecards will make county governments
more accountable and make the projects more locally acceptable,’ Mr.
Sielemann said.

 Head of Development for EU Eric Haber has said the union has aligned
its development agenda to the goals set by Kenya in its development
blueprint, Vision 2030 and is keen to see the implementation of the
Public Financial Financial Management Reforms and Devolution, which
are identified as priority areas in the second Medium Term Plan
2013-2018.

‘The EU delegation to Kenya is working with both National and County
governments in strengthening institutions of devolution to be more
responsive to the needs of the citizens, while at the same time
enabling citizens to actively participate in identifying and
implementing developmental projects,’ he adds.