President Uhuru Kenyatta skipped a meeting between the Council of Governors (CoG) and the County Assemblies Forum (CAF) in Naivasha on Tuesday, November 10.
Appearing in media interviews during the day, the leaders expressed hope that President Kenyatta and ODM leader Raila Odinga would honour their invite to the meeting in which they synchronised their demands over the Building Bridges Report.
However, the head of state had a packed schedule in Nairobi where he commissioned the Kenya Railways Transit Shed and launched the Nairobi Central Railway Station Refurbished under the modernization program of the Nairobi Commuter Rail Service.
Odinga, on his part, met China's Ambassador Zhou Pingjian who pledged more support for Kenya's industrial development.
Later, he condoled with the family of former Cabinet Minister Kyale Mwendwa who died aged 94.
In the Governors and MCAs forum, the leaders agreed to push for amendments into the BBI Report in regards to finance, security, representation among other issues.
They recommended that the Senate should be strengthened by ensuring that it has veto powers on all bills.
They agreed that the position of Deputy Ministers to be introduced and its occupants should be picked from Parliament.
Governors suggested that money should be disbursed to counties within 14 days of the approval of the formula by Parliament.
“We propose that in addition to the 35% all monies held by parastatals in national government departments performing devolved functions be transferred to counties,” the document read.
In terms of deputy governors, the county bosses decried that they should not be compelled to pick deputies of the opposite gender.
“To speed up the flow of funds to the counties, we propose that the Office of the Controller of Budget is decentralized to all the 47 county governments,” the leaders proposed.
“County Governments to be involved in security matters at both national and county level in the National Security Advisory Council and implement the County Policing Authority,” the forum suggested.
The leaders recommended that a pension fund be established for governors, deputy governors, county speakers and MCAs and other sounty State officers as is the case with the President, Deputy President, Speakers, MPs, and state officers at the national level.
