Nairobi News

Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko has threatened to withdraw from the agreement between City Hall and the national government citing frustrations in the implementation of the deal.

The Governor said he is now considering instituting the process to terminate the Deed of Transfer of functions between the two levels of government that saw four key functions transferred from his administration to the newly established Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS).

He said that he has already tasked a team of lawyers to carry out the paperwork before he moves to court next week to initiate the process if the frustrations from unnamed officers from State House do not stop.

“In fact, I am starting the process of terminating the Deed of Transfer of functions just like any other ordinary contract. I will personally go to court to have it terminated,” said Mr Sonko.

Initiated the process

He explained that President Uhuru Kenyatta and himself had good intentions when the initiated the process, however, some of his greedy officers in government especially the ones who hate him have hijacked the process to embarrass and frustrate him.

The City Hall boss further revealed that he was not given sufficient time to even read the draft of the Deed he signed at State House on February 25, 2020, and up to date, he has not been furnished with a copy of the Deed.

“I was just told it is a good thing on service delivery for the people of Nairobi as I deal with my court cases. And since I loved the people, I had to accept without even going through the document. I did not know it will turn against us,” he said.

The Deed provides that the deal can only be terminated by mutual written consent of both parties expressed in a common document.

And in the event of a dispute between the parties, the deed requires the parties to first seek resolution in an amicable fashion through negotiations.

Should they fail to reach an agreement within 30 days from the date either party writes to the other, the parties shall escalate the matter to the National and County Governments Coordinating Summit.

Mr Sonko’s personal assistant Ben Mulwa confirmed that the Governor is contemplating terminating the agreement as officers from the national government have been displaying dishonesty in its implementation.

He said the individuals have hijacked the process without the blessings from either the President or the governor and have now decided to play petty politics with the issue.

“There is a lot of disrespect that is coming from the individuals just within weeks after the maturity of the deal. We have another two years to go and we cannot go on like this,” Mr Mulwa said.

Create their own budget

He cited the current stalemate in regards to the Nairobi County Supplementary Appropriations Bill, 2020 accusing unnamed individuals of having worked in cahoots with Speaker Beatrice Elachi to create their own budget and approving it.

“We do not even know who authored the supplementary budget as it did not emanate from the Finance department, which should be the procedure,” said Mr Mulwa.

He accused Ms Elachi of impunity by the way she declined to subject the Governor’s Memorandum for debate by the assembly.

Mr Mulwa said that section 24 of the County Governments Act was clear on the two things that can happen when a governor returns a memorandum to the assembly where the assembly can debate and pass it wholly without any amendments or if there are any amendments then this can be done by two-thirds of the members of the House.

“What we witnessed is the Speaker sat alone and discussed it alone and rejected it yet she is an ex-officio member,” he said.

However, Ms Elachi has maintained that the memorandum raised constitutional issues that can only be interpreted by the courts and as such, she could not commit to any committee of the House for discussion.

“If the Governor is raising a question of constitutionality over the ancillary services then we cannot debate the memorandum. This can only be done by the courts and not the assembly,” said Ms Elachi.

The other red flag Mr Mulwa cited was the manner of transfer of more than 6, 000 City Hall staff to NMS by the Public Service Commission last month yet they are employees of the Nairobi County Public Service Board.