Professional services firms must devolve

An EABL bottling plant in Kenya. The EABL share came under pressure July 31, 2013 dropping by Sh14 to Sh335 as investors factored in the profit warning issued after markets closed on July 30. Photo/FILE  Nation Media Group

 

 

By Francis Muriu

In Summary

• Professional services firms must devolve as well, to play their part in enabling governors to deliver their mandate. Professionals at these firms ought to seize this opportunity to be a part of county service delivery.

The professional services industry in Kenya must devolve at the same pace as our country’s devolution, as we move from a central government to one national and 47 county governments.

On March 4, 2013, this started to become a reality when Kenyans voted for the position of governor for the first time in the history of our nation.

The County Government Act, 2012, provides the legal framework within which the governors are expected to operate. This is supplemented by various other pieces of legislation like the Public Finance Management Act, 2012.

The 47 governors have experiences from various backgrounds. It is incumbent on each governor to be familiar with all relevant legislation so as to deliver services.

In my view, there are two kinds of governors who will emerge as the election dust settles and the serious business of serving the electorate gains momentum.

One kind of governor will want to approach service delivery from a ‘Do-it-yourself’ point of view. What this means is that the governor will want to undertake all service delivery interventions by relying upon internal resources already in use like staff or systems.

There is no problem with this approach, but he will then have to ask very hard questions in terms of how well the county staff, processes, systems, etc. are adequately equipped and prepared to help him deliver services. The reality is that most counties may not be very well prepared to start providing services to citizens immediately.

I therefore foresee these kinds of governors experiencing challenges to service delivery from the word ‘go’ and problems may remain unresolved for some time during their terms.

The other kind of governor will want to pursue an all-inclusive approach and an attitude of, ‘Let the professionals do what they do best’.

He will incorporate professional services firms in his work plans and this will not only quickly start to build his staff and systems’ capacity but will enable him to dedicate his time and energy to deliver his core mandate and campaign promises—in other words, the real devolution of public services to the wananchi at the village level.

I have said before that professional services firms must devolve as well, to play their part in enabling governors to deliver their mandate. Professionals at these firms ought to seize this opportunity to be a part of county service delivery.

They have dedicated their lives to working with government and communities to address the social challenges that the wananchi encounter in their daily lives.

PwC has long believed that by working side-by-side with government, we can do our part to ensure that the systems (financial, as well as monitoring and evaluation), standards, processes, skills and other areas needed for effective devolution are put in place.

We are ready and willing to join the roundtable and discuss the roll-out of services like IT systems, financial management systems, resource needs assessments, capacity assessments, capacity building and others. We all have an obligation to leverage our expertise earlier.

Following their five year term, governors will face a moment of truth: did they fulfil their mandate and share a vision for the future?