By Anchor Writers
There was drama at the Machakos County Assembly today when Governor Wavinya Ndeti, accompanied by County Secretary Dr Muya Ndambuki and heavily built county inspectorate officers, stormed the Assembly offices to deliver her memorandum rejecting the County Appropriation Bill, 2026.
The Governor entered the Assembly offices and began looking for County Assembly Clerk Peter Mbatha, who was eventually found in the boardroom.
What followed was a heated confrontation between the Governor and the Clerk, with Wavinya accusing Mbatha and Assembly Speaker Anne Kiusya of frustrating the people of Machakos.
In the heated exchange, the Governor accused the Assembly leadership of presiding over a county in which hospitals were running short of medicine while garbage accumulated in urban centres.
The arguments eventually died down, after which Wavinya followed Mbatha to his office, where the Clerk formally received the memorandum returning the Appropriation Bill to the Assembly for reconsideration.
Sources told The Anchor that it was the Assembly’s turn to play hide and seek over mail delivery, a tactic the executive deploys on documents from the assembly. The Assembly resorted to pinning sensitive letters on he noticeboard outside the County Secretary’s offices whenever such frustrations arose.
The extraordinary scenes added a dramatic new chapter to the increasingly bitter confrontation between the Governor and the Assembly, which has been marked by disputes over budgets, appointments, expenditure and the management of county programmes.
Wavinya had earlier made clear that she would not assent to the budget approved by the Assembly on August 18.
In a statement delivered at the Assembly precincts and dated August 29, she invoked Section 24(2)(b) of the County Governments Act, 2012, formally referring the Bill back to the Assembly.
She said the decision was not made lightly but argued that the Assembly had made changes that violated statutory limits, undermined essential public services and threatened the county’s financial foundation.
The Executive had submitted a balanced KSh17.797 billion budget for the 2026/2027 financial year, based on the ceilings contained in the 2026 County Fiscal Strategy Paper.
According to Wavinya, the Assembly subsequently altered allocations amounting to KSh853.96 million.
The Governor’s memorandum identifies a number of cuts she considers particularly damaging.The Assembly removed the entire KSh175.86 million allocation for the Machakos Youth Service.
It also reduced the Wikwatyo Fund by KSh100 million, from KSh137 million to KSh37 million, and cut a further KSh100 million from the programme for empowerment of women, youth and special groups.
The bursary allocation was reduced by KSh30 million, from KSh121.79 million to KSh91.79 million.
Wavinya described the reductions as an assault on vulnerable groups and young people, arguing that they would affect elderly citizens, persons with disabilities, women and needy schoolchildren.
The Assembly also deleted KSh78.32 million allocated for contracted garbage collection in Machakos, Mavoko and Kangundo-Tala municipalities.Wavinya said the allocation was intended to keep refuse collection services running in some of the county’s most densely populated urban centres.
She warned that withdrawing the money could leave garbage uncollected in places such as Mlolongo, Athi River, Machakos Town and Tala, creating public health risks.
The Governor further complained that the Assembly had removed KSh126.90 million allocated for the Integrated County Revenue Management System.
She said the digital system had helped increase the county’s own-source revenue from KSh1.55 billion in 2023/2024 to KSh2.18 billion in 2024/2025 and KSh3.352 billion in 2025/2026.The county’s 2026/2027 budget is projecting KSh4.93 billion in own-source revenue.
Wavinya therefore argued that cutting the system’s allocation could undermine the county’s ability to raise the money required to finance its programmes.
The Assembly also cut KSh65.38 million from the KSh396.64 million proposed for major roads.
The Governor said the money was intended for ongoing works on the Katangi–Kithimani Road, Mlolongo Phase 3–Gossip Road and Lita–Miti Muonza Road.
She warned that reducing allocations for projects already under contract could expose the county to breach-of-contract claims and other costs.
The memorandum also challenges a KSh97 million reduction in the proposed KSh112.74 million allocation for sub-county offices and overall coordination.Wavinya said the cuts would leave eight sub-counties with approximately KSh565,048 each for the entire financial year, severely limiting grassroots administration and public participation.
At the centre of the Governor’s legal argument is Regulation 37(1) of the Public Finance Management (County Governments) Regulations, 2015.
Wavinya says the regulation restricts increases or reductions made by the Assembly to an annual budget vote ceiling to one per cent.
She further argues that the Assembly breached Section 129 of the Public Finance Management Act by increasing its own development budget by KSh130 million above the ceiling agreed in the County Fiscal Strategy Paper, with the money coming from Executive programmes.
The Assembly has yet to publicly respond to the Governor’s memorandum or provide its detailed justification for the disputed reallocations.
That response will be critical because the dispute is not simply about whether particular programmes deserve more or less money.
Wavinya critics allege that the huge amounts rerouted by the Assembly are aimed at funding the Governor’s and Wiper campaigns in the 2027 elections.
It raises a larger constitutional question over the respective powers of the County Assembly and Executive in the preparation, approval and implementation of the county budget.
The Assembly has the constitutional mandate to consider and approve county budgets and exercise oversight over the Executive.
The Governor, however, is responsible for implementing county policies and programmes and has now exercised her statutory power to return the Appropriation Bill for reconsideration.
Under Section 24 of the County Governments Act, if the Assembly rejects the Governor’s reservations and resolves to pass the Bill in its original form, it requires the support of at least two-thirds of all members.
The next stage of the budget dispute could therefore produce another major confrontation between the two arms of Machakos County government.
For residents, the stakes are considerably higher than the political theatre witnessed at the Assembly offices.
The disputed allocations touch directly on roads, garbage collection, revenue collection, youth programmes, bursaries, social protection and grassroots administration.
Wavinya says the Assembly’s amendments threaten essential services.
The Assembly has an opportunity to demonstrate that its reallocations were a legitimate exercise of its budgetary and oversight mandate and to explain what it intended to achieve with the funds it should be.
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