Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko has refused to assent to a bill allocating more than Sh15 billion to the Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS) for city operations.
The move escalates the pull and push between Governor Sonko and Maj-Gen Mohammed Badi who chairs the NMS.
Sonko referred the Nairobi County Supplementary Appropriation Bill, 2020 back to the assembly, saying amendments in it contravened provisions of the law.
The bill, which was passed by the Nairobi County Assembly on April 2, 2020, saw the office of the governor and his deputy lose Sh203 million.
“The blanket transfer of all the support functions to NMS will deny the remaining functions the same ancillary services they require to deliver services,” said Sonko in a letter to the County Assembly.
Sonko had earlier opposed the redeployment of over 6,000 workers from the county to NMS.
“The amendments by the Assembly to the bill that gives rise to these irregular transfers and allocation was done without the input of the county executive committee member of finance contrary to provisions of Public Finance Management Act,” Sonko said.
In the letter to Speaker Beatrice Elachi, Sonko complained that the assembly had irregularly transferred and allocated monies to functions that were not even moved to the NMS office.
“I do hereby refuse to assent to the bill for the reasons contained in the attached memorandum, and accordingly, I do hereby refer the bill back to the Assembly for consideration in accordance with section 24(3) (4) and (5) of the County Governments Act,” he said in an April 15 letter copied to Attorney-General Paul Kihara, the Controller of Budget and the Government Printer.
