TOWARDS SUCCESSFUL IGR IN DEVOLVED KENYA

1. TOWARDS SUCCESSFUL IGR IN DEVOLVED KENYA KEMOLI SAGALA

2. OUTLINE • What is IGR? Why IGR? • What are the key features of IGR? • What are the Instruments of IGR? • What are the Patterns of IGR in Kenya? • What Constitutes Successful IGR? • Proposals to Improve IGR in Kenya

3. What is IGR? Why IGR? • “Activities or interactions occurring between governmental units of all types and levels” (Anderson, 1960:3). • Simply, inter-unit transactions both vertical between levels of government and horizontal within branches of government. • IGR is in fact a Public Good and not a private arrangement between and within governments. IGR is funded by tax payers.

4. What are the key Features of IGR? • Occurs within and between all levels and branches of government • Human Relations and Human Behavior • Are not one-time, occasional occurrences, formally ratified in agreements or rigidly fixed by statutes or court decisions;” rather they are every day forms of interactions and contacts consisting of both formal and informal interactions.

5. What are the key Features of IGR? • IGR manifests itself in the different roles played by public officials and presumes that public officials operate with a systemic awareness of their functional role • IGR is about Policy Coordination and Policy Procedure, the how to do things regarding financial issues, politics, and policy

6. What are the Instruments of IGR in Kenya? • The CoK 2010 stipulated the relationship between the two levels of government (Article 6), • The Principles of Devolution (Article 174), • The Basis for Cooperation and Engagement (Article 189). • The Intergovernmental Relations Act 2012 provides for the Summit and the Council • Article 187 of the PFM Act 2012 created the Intergovernmental Budget and Economic Council (IBEC).

7. Other Instruments of IGR • Intergovernmental Fiscal Relationships • Intergovernmental Regulation • Governmental Structures • Political Forces-Political Parties: There are massive political, economic, and administrative interests, particularly the political factors that include institutional structure, ideology, election cycle

8. What are the Patterns of IGR in Kenya? • CONFLICTUAL OR COOPERATIVE?

9. Why is there so much Tension and Conflict? • Devolution is new to Kenya and each independent level and branch of government is trying to assert its powers and authority • Poor Understanding of the Roles, Functions, Powers, and Reporting and Oversight Responsibilities of Various levels and branches of government

10. Why is there so much Tension and Conflict? • Supremacy wars where different actors want to out do each other • Lack of Civic Duty-Civic education and awareness amongst elected officials • Overreliance on the Courts to Resolve Political differences.

11. Why is there so much Tension and Conflict? • Competing Priorities-Preferences • National Government would prefer to devolve Administrative > Fiscal > Political powers County Govts prefer P> F> A • Because we have adopted Regulatory Devolution with stipulations, rules, directives that are largely coercive. • BUT WHAT WE NEED IS COOPERATIVE-CONSULTATIVE DEVOLUTION • Why Can’t we get There?

12. Why Can’t we get There? • Lack of Political Will • The Resolution of IGR problems in practice in “any country reflects ……the myriad of political forces currently at play in that country and its past history” (Bird, 1990: 278). • In practice, IGR “transcends constitutional-legal approaches to the divisions of government and their respective powers and duties” (Agranoff, 1994: 166). • IGR is about what is politically feasible

13. What Constitutes Successful IGR?

14. Proposals to Improve IGR in Kenya • Intergovernmental Agreements (Great Britain, USA, Canada, Brazil, Mexico) • To Co-ordinate or harmonize policies • To manage process and procedure (how do they do it? how do they resolve disputes?). • Perform a 'para-constitutional' function to circumvent the formal distribution of powers • Enhance 'regulation by contract‘ and ‘contractual grants’ to alter behavior of county governments • Agreements are instruments of soft-law

15. Proposals to Improve IGR in Kenya • Form Advisory Committee on IGR e.g in USA, Great Britain • Massive Civic Education • Deploy Intergovernmental Relations Specialists (e.g., Australia). • The TA needed IGR Specialists, • Indeed all levels and branches of government, various commissions, and the Council of Governors all need IGR specialists • Intergovernmental Relations Technical Committee- Job Ad

16. Proposals to Improve IGR in Kenya • Political and Cultural Re-socialization • Need for both the governing class and the governed to appreciate how the new system of governance is rolled out and what is expected of each actor at every stage of the devolution process. • Indeed, “reformers must try not to do too much too quickly and they should phase steps in a logical way to the extent possible. It is not necessary to turn over all constitutionally or legally mandated responsibilities” to devolved units immediately (Smoke, 2003: 14).

17. THANKS! • QUESTIONS