Staff payroll system heads to counties

Devolution and Planning Cabinet Secretary Anne Waiguru with Secretary General of the Kenya Health Professionals’ Union (KHPU) Moses Lorre (right) at Mayfair hotel, Nairobi on December 20, 2013. Photo/ JEFF ANGOTE / FILE 

In Summary

• The Council of Governors had demanded that the Government allow counties to take charge of their staff payrolls as early as this month.

By LUCAS BARASA
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The national government is ready to transfer management of staff payroll to counties starting this month.

Devolution and Planning Cabinet Secretary Anne Waiguru said the exercise of transfer of payroll began on January 6 and completion expected on Wednesday.

“This will enable the counties to prepare and pay January salaries in a timely manner,” she said.

The Council of Governors had demanded that the Government allow counties to take charge of their staff payrolls as early as this month.

In a meeting held to debate on county staff rationalising, Council of Governors Chair Isaac Ruto said:

“We do not want anyone to prescribe solutions to governors on staff rationalisation because each situation is unique. Counties want to take charge of the staff payrolls as early as this month in a seamless manner.”

EMBRACE INNOVATION

Mr Ruto said there was need to be open-minded and embrace innovations in human resource management.

He regretted that some officers seconded by the national government to counties were unwilling to co-operate with governors and chief officers in the regional governments.

But Wednesday, Ms Waiguru maintained that her ministry is coordinating the transfer of payroll to counties.

She noted that the draft guidelines for management of staff deemed seconded to counties are in the final stage of internal consultations.

The guidelines seek to operationalise the secondment of staff to counties and provides for terms and conditions of seconded staff, training, discipline, pension, establishment and abolition of offices during the transition period and overall management of seconded staff by county governments.

TALKS WITH HEALTH WORKERS

According to Ms Waiguru, the national and county governments were also sharing in the development of a generic organisation and grading structure and provided a sample of descriptions, grading and organisational structures that could be adopted by all counties.

This is meant to standardise human resource structures across national and county governments. “We anticipate convening a broader consultative meeting with key stakeholders including the unions and other relevant stakeholders by the end of January 2014 in line with our commitment,” Ms Waiguru said.

The CS reiterated the importance of the installation of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Data system in all 47 counties and training of 219 officers on management of payroll in the counties.

“All counties have confirmed that they are using the system and have established capacity to manage the payroll,” she said.

She added that negotiations with the union of health workers in December agreed on the need to hasten the conclusion of a policy framework ton guide the human resource management aspects of all staff undertaking devolved functions by February.

Under legal notice number 137 of 2013, the national government transferred devolved functions to county governments except the payroll function that was retained for six months to facilitate a seamless transition

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COUNTIES READY

Mandera County Governor Ali Roba said counties were ready to handle the payroll function. “For us in Mandera, we are working and planning towards that.

“The workforce we inherited is not much. Most are in Ministry of Health and that of Agriculture,” he said adding that a national audit indicated that the county is 97 percent understaffed.

However, the county is recruiting staff to curb the deficit and Mr Roba said 250 health personnel have since been recruited. “We only inherited 150 health personnel from national government,” Mr Roba said.

The governor said his county was in process of recruiting staff for other ministries including infrastructure. “Our programmes are ongoing to ensure we have adequate staff for better service delivery,” Mr Roba said.