The Senate’s quest for a larger distribution of funds for counties in the current fiscal year has resulted in an impasse between lawmakers and the National Treasury.
The Senate has rejected the Treasury’s proposal to provide the devolved units Sh380 billion.
Instead, MPs have argued that the counties should receive Sh400.1 billion.
However, the Treasury claimed that it could only afford to contribute Sh380 billion, a position that the National Assembly supported.
Senators voted on Thursday to reject the Division of Revenue Bill, 2024, which would distribute Sh380 billion to the counties.
Despite the fact that their National Assembly counterparts supported the cut, all elected senators voted to keep the original bill’s Sh400.1 billion budget. The bill faced no opposition from any senator.
The measure has prompted negotiations between the Treasury and the National Assembly.
Parliament initially approved an allocation of Sh400.1 billion but immediately introduced revisions following the withdrawal of the Finance Bill, 2024.
Senate Finance and Budget Committee chairman Ali Roba said the counties should not suffer as a result of the shortfall in the national revenue.
“The meaning of downward revision of projected ordinary revenue means that we have deleted the proposal that would have seen both counties and national government bearing the brunt whenever there is a shortfall because this proposal is not tenable,” Roba said.
“We have only proposed a reduction of the national government sharable revenue from Sh2.6 trillion to Sh2.2 trillion while maintaining the sharable revenue at 400.1 billion as passed by the initial Division of Revenue Bill,” he added.
