Human Rights Body Wants County Government to Involve Locals in Public Participation
By Ronald Ngoba
Email, thecoastnewspaper@gmail.com
The Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC) has faulted Kilifi County government on how it has been involving people during public participation exercise.
In its report which analyzed Budgets in the financial years 2021/ 2022, 2022/2023 and the first nine months of 2023/2024 show that most of the residents expressed dissatisfaction with the way public participation was conducted.
Gro With Us Co-founder Kelly Banda and Kilifi youths expressed disappointment that public participation had become cosmetic in the county’s business.
Banda said there were selected people who were invited to the public participation forums to rubber stamp what the executive wanted passed.
“Meeting are only announced to selected people and even if you managed to attend your views will not be fixtured in final document. The short notice given for these meetings, usually four days or less, makes it difficult for people to plan and attend. By the time most people hear about the meetings, they are over.”
He said even when residents were able to attend the forums, the documents presented for discussion were also written in technical language, making it difficult to be understood.
“Many residents have insisted for the documents to be simplified to Kiswahili or mother-tongue so that it can be understood by majority but has not materialized. A pile of documents is presented on the same day and the residents are expected to give feedback. With the high levels of illiteracy in Kilifi what results do we expect from such a practice,” asked Francis Thoya, a Kilifi youth innovator.
The innovator disclosed that most of the forums were used to rubber stamp already predetermined outcomes.
“When it come residents giving out views, our proposals don’t appear anywhere in the final document making it like an exercise to tick boxes rather than to collect views,” he said.
According to him the exclusion of marginalized groups from budgetary processes has led to a growing sense of disillusionment among many residents
Residents feel discriminated when their needs are not being prioritised especially when it comes to critical sectors such as water, healthcare, education, agriculture and environmental matters.
“Residents have been asking for better, healthcare services, clean water and improved road access but nothing has materialized,” said Kennedy Lugo, a resident from Chumani.
The lack of public participation also raised concerns about transparency and accountability in Kilifi’s budget making process, read the KHRC report.
The report also acknowledged the efforts the county was doing to address the issues raised.
It further recommended that the county needs to operationalised provisions on matters of public participation such as the release of the annual status of public participation report by the governor.
“In addition, the county should develop the public participation guidelines for an open and free for all forums, simplify budget documents to Kiswahili language for easy consumption, distribution of the document in timely manner to allow for proper planning by communities and also to advertise the forums in alternative places such as market and churches and chief’s baraza’s,” the report said.
An official from the county government who spoke on condition of anonymity said plans were underway to use alternative platforms such as community radios and chiefs baraza’s to announce such forums so that more people are informed.
