Governor Lelelit to pick chief officers after aptitude tests
Samburu Governor Lati Lelelit says the plan is to increase school enrolment
Samburu Governor Jonathan Lelelit is set to pick chief officers following a "competitive" recruitment drive.
The county earlier resolved to use aptitude tests in the chief officers’ recruitment drive, and only 54 candidates out of 161 convinced examiners.
The decision to use aptitude tests, according to Governor Lelelit, is to ensure Samburu gets the right people, qualified in their professional fields to fill in the vacant positions.
Candidates who passed the aptitude tests proceeded to the next level, where oral interviews were conducted. The aptitude test seen by the Nation had diverse and closed rigid questions on administration, current affairs, analysis and problem-solving tests.
The county boss insists that recruitment of the officials to fill in the positions will not be a reward to political cronies, but to competent individuals. Mr Lelelit had earlier noted that reckless recruitments and political appointments previously have seen incompetent people occupy public offices, and resulted in a dismal performance.
"My administration is very keen on who gets into office. That is why we are conducting a thorough recruitment exercise so that at the end, we get qualified individuals," said Mr Lelelit.
The county chief is also striving to attain regional balance among the three constituencies, minority groups, gender and people living with disabilities. The recruitment, once done, nominees' names will be handed to the county assembly for approval.
Mr Lelelit, through an executive order, made changes in the governance structure and increased the number of chief officers from 14 in the past administration to 19, including a county solicitor. In the changes, eight departments will get two chief officers each.
For instance, the Ministry of Land will get a chief officer in charge of Lands and Physical Planning and another in charge of Housing and Urban Development. The Finance docket will get a chief officer in charge of Finance and another in charge of Economic Planning and ICT, while Agriculture will get two COs in charge of Crop Production and Livestock Production respectively.
The office of the governor will get two chief officers, one in charge of Special Programmes and another in charge of Public Service Management and Administration, while the office of the county attorney will get a county solicitor.
Mr Lelelit who is expected to more changes in his new administration has already announced a purge on lazy and incompetent county workers. The governor announced he is seeking to conduct a human resource audit of all its staff members as part of efforts to eliminate ghost workers and address the burgeoning wage bill crisis.
He said the move will clean up the payroll and purge ghost workers who are earning from their comfortable homes. Mr Lelelit said the staff audit will ensure the wage bill reflects the correct number of employees against payroll numbers.
