By Antynet Ford
Nairobi City County Assembly has passed the first supplementary budget for the financial year 2024/25 during a special sitting convened today.
Amongst the key reallocations made in the supplementary include:
An additional Sh150 million for emergency funds to combat disasters and respond to recoveries within the office of the governor and his deputy.
The City County is also set to procure emergency relief items for the fire fighting and rescue department with a budget of Sh100 million set.
The assembly reallocated Sh400 million towards the school feeding program to continue with the Dishi Na County program.
To improve sports culture and talent development, the assembly reallocated Sh68 million to purchase uniforms for the Talent Skills Development sector while Sh100 million was set aside for revenue collection expenses within the Finance sector.
Mwiki and Woodley stadiums, Umoja 1 Tena grounds are also set to benefit as they have been allocated Sh30 million and Sh20 million respectively as there is set also to be a construction of an ablution block at the Macmillan library at Sh5 million.
The finance and economic planning sector gets an increase of Sh70 million.
The health sector has been granted an additional Sh300 million for the purchase of health commodities and improved Community health services.
In the recurrent expenditure for the health sector, the assembly allocated Sh47 million to be used for the supply of oxygen to Mama Lucy Hospital together with other county installations.
Despite having recently purchased waste trucks, the assembly has set Sh604 million for the purchase of more trucks and equipment for solid waste management collection.
The Central Business District will now have additional litter bins which have been countable as the assembly set Sh50 million for the purchase of the bins while a further Sh100 million has been reallocated for the green Nairobi army.
The public works, transport, and infrastructure sector has been granted Sh797 million with more roads across the eighty-five wards being factored in for development.
The roads will be carpeted and have routine maintenance.
The staff shall smile in the remaining part of the financial year as the assembly has allocated Sh434 million for their medical cover.
Generally, there has been an overall development reduction of Sh2.1 billion with Sh1.48 billion being cut from the wellness and nutrition sector, Sh846.9 million from the talent, Skills, and development sector, Sh253.6 million in the Business and hustler opportunities sector and Sh169 million from the built environment and urban planning.
The Innovation and Digital Economy Sector has also faced a reduction of Sh72 million, while the Agriculture, Livestock Development, and Fisheries Sector has got a Sh54 million cut and the boroughs and public administration have a Sh92 million reduction.
Asked what Nairobi will be doing to reduce the pending bills Mabatini MCA and Budget chairman Wilfred Odalo said there will be at no time when the city-county shall have its bill reduced hence the introduction of a regularization bill to cater for the deficit will be introduced in the next two weeks.
“Nairobi is a service delivery county and by saying there will be a reduction of bills, we will be lying. We will be doing the regularization bill to cater to the deficit so that the money is added to pay contractors and suppliers,” Odallo said.
Read also:- Nairobi County Allocates Sh1.26 Billion to Settle Pending Bills in Supplementary Budget
