President Uhuru Kenyatta on Friday issued an order freezing all new government projects until the ongoing ones are completed.
The President noted that the move is aimed to stop wastage of resources and the habit of government agencies abandoning incomplete projects before launching the next.
Uhuru then warned all government accounting officers that they would be held personally liable should they sanction new projects without direct authority from the National Treasury.
Despite the order, according to law, ministry departments can still go ahead and sanction new projects as long as they do so in line with the Public Finance Management Act, 2016.
[caption caption="Deputy President William Ruto launching a project"]
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The Act allows for deviation from budgetary financial objectives subject to Parliamentary approval.
Part of the act reads: "The national government may, with the approval of Parliament, deviate from the financial objectives in a Budget Policy Statement on a temporary basis where such deviation is necessitated by a major natural disaster or other significant unforeseen events."
It states that Treasury shall provide a report to Parliament regarding the deviation, and shall include in the report reasons for and the implications of the deviation, proposals to address the deviation, and the period the deviation is estimated to last.
After following the above procedures, the Treasury will publish and publicise the report made after its submission to Parliament after fifteen days.
Moreso, the directive means that monies already allocated in the budget for projects that are yet to kick off will remain idle.
According to the laid out structures, the only way to put the money to use is if the president asks Treasury to present a supplementary budget in Parliament to have the funds reallocated to other projects that have already been started.
If that shall not happen, then the funds allocated to the new projects will have to be returned to the treasury at the end of the 2018/2019 financial year.
[caption caption="Transport CS James Macharia claps as President Uhuru Kenyatta launches construction works"]
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