County politics now threaten to dim Vision 2030

Vision 2030 director general Julius Muia: “We are focussing on key pillars of the country’s economic plan without regard to political affiliations of the various regions”. PHOTO | Liz Muthoni | NMG 

By KEVIN MWANZA

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By JAMES KARIUKI

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Summary

• Devolved governments deliberately ignoring the national economic blueprint in favour of their own projects.

Kenya’s Vision 2030 is facing serious headwinds. The team in charge of the ambitious long-term plan that got its feet during President Mwai Kibaki’s regime has said it is facing a number of hurdles in implementing its projects in some counties.

The secretariat in charge of the 20-year plan said on Friday that some counties were not implementing projects that are supposed to ensure the success of the economic blueprint.

Vision 2030 director general Julius Muia said while some counties such as Machakos, Makueni and Kajiado had embraced the milestones set in the strategy plan, others — in what is considered opposition zones like in Nyanza — have adopted their own strategies that are not envisioned in the development blueprint.

Other counties like Mombasa and Kisumu are yet to provide land for establishment of Special Economic Zones (SEZ) in areas identified as strategic and attractive to foreign investments in the manufacturing sector.

This, Dr Muia said, was causing delays in achieving some targets of the master plan.

“It takes four to six years to formulate a policy, which includes benchmarking trips and tedious work between government and private sector players, to streamline policies that support development.

For a county government to ignore this development is to derail national projects,” Dr Muia told a workshop convened by Strathmore University for business journalists.

Vision 2030 was developed and adopted in 2008 with an aim of turning Kenya into a middle class economy through industrialisation. The plan is hinged on achieving a double-digit growth rate until the year 2030 and was divided into five-year medium-term plans.

The plan, which is now in the last leg of its second phase, has also been dogged by slower than expected economic growth and lower investment levels.

During the first five years (2008-2012) of the plan, the economy grew at an average 4.18 per cent against a target of 8.66 per cent, while investment averaged 20 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP), compared with a target of 27 per cent.

These metrics also lagged behind target in the second medium-term plan (2013-2017).

The advent of the devolved government in 2013, in line with the 2010 Constitution, marked a shift in the way projects were implemented as the new semi-autonomous governments had a sway on the projects to engage in.

Dr Muia said this governance change, which was not anticipated in the master plan, has exposed some projects under the vision’s five pillars to political interference in some counties.

“What we would wish to see is institutionalised planning where politics is totally divorced from our flagship projects,” he said. “We need to seriously focus on collaboration between the national and county governments.”

Ms Veronicah Muthoni-Okoth, macro and economic pillar director at the Vision 2030 secretariat, said they were currently implementing about 182 projects across the country.

Counties such as Makueni, Kajiado and Machakos have supported projects envisioned in the central government’s master plan, such as establishment of Konza Technopolis and the Lamu Port-South Sudan-Ethiopia-Transport (Lapset) corridor project.

Other Vision 2030 projects include the multi-billion-shilling Standard Gauge Railway, electricity generation, expansion of higher education opportunities, revamping of Mombasa port and expansion of Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

This year has been particularly difficult for the economy as a drought that started in the last quarter of 2016 ravaged agriculture, while credit growth almost grinded to a halt under the heavy yoke of interest rates caps and a prolonged electioneering period.

The government was forced to review its growth forecast to 5.1 per cent from 5.9 per cent set previously.

The fiscal deficit could be wider than expected as revenue collections fell below target, while expenses increased on the back of food imports to cushion consumers from price spikes.

A report by the Vision 2030 secretariat, dubbed “Moving on from elections 2017 to economic growth and Vision 2030” showed that tourism, one of the main revenue earners and employers, contributed a paltry 2.39 per cent to the GDP as visitors stayed away.