Public Budgeting, a Challenge for Development in Africa : Evidence from Kenya

In this paper public budgeting in Kenya as evidence of challenges for development in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is examined. Tracing the efforts made by the Kenya government since independence in 1963 to 2012, successes, failures, and challenges to successful public budgeting regime in the country are outlined. Furthermore, using data from the World Bank database, country policy and institutional assessment (CPIA) index for 10 SSA countries including Burkina Faso, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zimbabwe are compared. Key challenges in service delivery and leakages of public resources are identified. These challenges are attributed to problems related to allocation of funds, monitoring of public expenditure, identification and ranking of development priorities, inflexible budgetary procedures, and lack of a legal framework for stakeholder participation in planning and implementation in public budgeting. Across the region, statistics show no significant improvement in indicators of public financial management in the 10 SSA countries for the period 2005 through 2011 despite the high and significant association between financial management indicators and annual GDP growth percentage. It is hoped that structural initiatives recently adopted in Kenya and currently being implemented may remedy this situation. These include; implementation of Vision 2030 and the new constitution, the CDF initiative, and the recent establishment of key institutions like Kenya Revenue Authority, Office of Fiscal Analysis, and legislative framework in the Financial Management Act No.5