Revenue: The ‘smoking gun’ in Mutai Senate battle
Kericho Governor Erick Mutai.
The impeachment of Kericho Governor Erick Mutai has evolved into a contentious legal and political matter, primarily centered on his administration's failure to meet revenue collection targets and accusations of financial mismanagement.
Dr Mutai was impeached by 31 out of 47 Members of the Kericho County Assembly despite a court injunction stopping the process.
The matter has been escalated to the Senate for concurrence and confirmation on the backdrop of another High Court injunction against the move.
Justice Joseph Sergon of the Kericho High Court issued the two orders, which Dr Mutai's lead legal counsels - Katwa Kigen and Manase Tunen - stated were breached by the assembly.
Sigowet MCA Kiprotich Rogony, the mover of the motion, cited the county’s underperformance in collecting its own source revenue as a central issue.
According to Mr Rogony, the county has not maximised its potential revenue due to a failure to digitise revenue collection systems, leading to substantial losses.
“The performance of the county government’s own-source revenue collection has been below par. We have the ability to overshoot the Sh1 billion target, but due to lack of digitisation of the revenue platforms, we have dismally performed,” said Mr Rogony.
The MCAs argue that the county government has not implemented the 2019 Valuation Roll passed by the assembly, leading to a significant loss of revenue from land and property rates.
The valuation roll is a key mechanism in determining property taxes, which, if properly enforced, could have boosted the county's revenue collection significantly.
Significant improvement
However, despite these accusations, data from the Controller of Budget (CoB) Margaret Nyakang'o, paints a slightly different picture.
In her annual reports, Dr Nyakang'o noted that Kericho County had seen significant improvements in revenue collection over the last two financial years.
For instance in the 2023-2024 financial year, the county collected Sh841.93 million, a 67.9 percent increase from the previous year’s collection of Sh501 million.
"The amount collected was 78.9 percent of the annual target and 13.7 percent of the equitable revenue share disbursed during the period under review," Dr Nyakang'o stated in her report.
The health sector emerged as the biggest contributor to the county’s revenue, accounting for Sh482 million, or 57 percent of the total amount collected during the 2023-2024 financial year.
Other key revenue streams included land and property rates, which brought in Sh135 million (16 percent of total collections), and single business permits, which generated Sh76 million (9 percent). Market fees, bus park charges, and other sources contributed the remaining revenue, with the bus park fees performing the worst at just Sh16.9 million.
But despite this improved performance, the MCAs remain unsatisfied.
They argue that the revenue records are not reflective of the actual amounts collected, claiming that continued use of manual collection systems has led to widespread pilferage.
“The records of the money collected are not reflective of the actual amount at source. This has been brought about by failure to implement the shift from manual to digital collection of revenue on all platforms,” Mr Rogony asserted.
Dr Mutai on his part has defended his administration’s efforts to improve revenue collection, highlighting several initiatives aimed at digitising the county’s revenue streams.
“The health sector revenue platform is fully digitised, thus the rise in collection. The digitisation of revenue collection is an ongoing process,” he said, pointing to the success of the health sector's revenue collection as proof that his administration was on the right track.
Mr Mutai’s defence however failed to sway the majority of the County Assembly, leading to his impeachment.
The MCAs’ decision to impeach the governor has now set the stage for a battle in the Senate, which must either uphold or reject the County Assembly’s decision.
Senate Speaker Amason Kingi confirmed last Thursday that he had received the impeachment resolution from the Kericho County Assembly and assured the Senate would address the matter appropriately.
Dr Mutai obtained orders from the High Court restraining the Senate from receiving the papers following the resolution by the County Assembly on October 2, 2024 that voted to impeach him.
Justice Sergon directed that the governor continues performing his duties as usual until the petition he has filed is heard and determined.
“An order is hereby issued for the petitioner to retain, hold, serve and discharge all functions of the Governor Kericho County Government,” Justice Sergon stated in the orders issued on Thursday last week.
Interim orders barring the assembly from transmitting the resolutions to the Senate were issued by the court which also stopped the Senate from receiving and processing the resolution from the County Assembly.
“Pending the interparties hearing of the motion dated October 2, 2024, an order is hereby issued to restrain the Senate as Plenary of at any Senate Committees and or discussing and or making any decision or resolution in regard to the impeachment of the petitioner – Governor of Kericho County on 2nd October,2024,” Justice Sergon directed.
Parties involved are set to give oral highlights on the matter on October 15, 2024 before the court.
It remains to be seen whether the Senate will proceed with the hearing or it will allow the judicial process to proceed first.
