The County Executive Committee Member for Water, Irrigation, Environment, Sanitation and Climate Change, Hon. Onesmus Kuyu convened a high-level performance review meeting at the Machakos Conference Center with the six licensed water service providers operating within the county to evaluate their Financial Year 2025/2026 performance.
The meeting undertook a comprehensive review of revenue performance, with a strong emphasis on strengthening Own Source Revenue (OSR).
Key focus areas included improving billing efficiency, reducing Non-Revenue Water (NRW), enhancing metering accuracy, digitizing billing systems, cleansing customer databases, and reinforcing debt collection mechanisms to boost financial stability.
Expenditure management was equally scrutinized, with discussions centered on strict adherence to approved budgets, prudent financial practices, compliance with Public Finance Management (PFM) principles, optimal staff cost ratios, energy cost control, procurement efficiency, and effective absorption of capital development funds. The companies were directed to rationalize recurrent expenditure to enhance long-term sustainability.
Customer growth and service coverage were also assessed, including new water connections, network expansion, service reliability, and the elimination of illegal connections.
The CECM emphasized that expansion must be aligned with existing infrastructure capacity and sustainable water resource management.
Additionally, pending bills and debt management were reviewed, covering supplier obligations, inter-agency liabilities, historical debts, and aged receivables.
The providers were instructed to develop structured debt repayment plans and strengthen receivables recovery strategies to improve cash flow and operational resilience.
Hon. Onesmus Kuyu reaffirmed that under the leadership of H.E. Governor Wavinya Ndeti, the County Government remains committed to enhancing water service delivery through financial discipline, operational efficiency, and expanded access—directing service providers to transition from survival mode to sustainable, growth-oriented operations that meet the needs of Machakos residents.
By Anthony Solly
