Executing the digital government idea is Kenya’s best chance to end systemic graft
President Uhuru Kenyatta. Late last year he announced plans to form the Office of Management and Budget but so far it has not come to fruition. PHOTO | FILE
The silver lining around Kenya’s corruption fever is the experientially growing column inches devoted to the subject by an increasing number of observers and commentators in the media.
This is no longer simply about a foreign or donor-driven agenda; it is our local problem — pure and simple.
A few months after Kanu was headlined as warning Jubilee over graft, former President Daniel Moi last Sunday reportedly asked Christians at a church service (and senior government officials at large) to — effectively — “help the government fight this bad thing that is giving it a bad image”.
In the past week, positive and interesting anti-corruption suggestions have emerged around the need for a “Look East” approach (case studies Singapore-China-India), the requirement for a “cultural revolution”, the search for an “anti-corruption enabling environment” and the absolute urgency for budget, but more broadly, public financial management (PFM) reform.
More frightening is the unconscionable idea that President Uhuru Kenyatta is in hand to hand combat with an individual, or group of individuals – basically a super cartel – who believe they fully control not just a significant proportion of our national budget in their private interest, but – effectively - national economic policy through a stranglehold on public investment choices.
In official “anti-corruption speak”, this is called “state capture”. I cannot get my head around that and then convince myself to line up for six hours in Independent Electoral Boundary Commission’s (IEBC) — disorganised queues to vote for anyone in 2017.
One gets the sense that our “tiger pronouncing its tigritude” approach to this deadly war is doomed to fail – we are “barking at the moon”. Yet, if we really see corruption as a national security threat, then we must deal with it in the same way we would (more comprehensively) deal with terror.
We could do this in a way that is as sharp as it is smart. Today, let’s speak to two missed chances to date.
Digital government
In its early days, the Jubilee administration developed a world-class ICT masterplan for Kenya around three pillars – ICT for business, ICT as business and digital government.
Let’s cut to the chase and focus on the digital government part. The idea was rather simple. Digital government (and eventually, commercial) services would be built around four interconnected “data hubs” – persons, companies, land and assets.
Digital re-registration and re-identification around these four hubs was the basic plan. A biometric, multi-purpose, multi-service personal identification card for every person. Radio frequency identification (RFID) and certification for companies, land and assets.
At bottom, a national digital registration and identification system that linked people to the companies they own, and people and companies to their land and assets. This was to be a true “game changer”.
What do we have today? A fancy e-government, e-citizen front office with shaky back office data amidst official speeches calling for integration of what are now “vendor-driven” separate projects for persons, companies and land, with nothing really going on in terms of asset identification.
So the “ghosts” (Anglo Leasing et al) live to fight another day. Everyone (IEBC et al) pursues their own biometric “something”.
The idea’s greatest supporters – KRA, bankers and mobile telcos – fail to reap the “digital dividend”. Analogue-dependent corruption and insecurity persists.
Office of Management and Budget
The OMB was, and is, a true “wild card” idea that the Mr Kenyatta promised to deliver in his November speeches around the re-organisation of government.
Its real benefit would derive from creating a real connection between planning, budgeting and performance management.
This time let’s ignore actual budget numbers and look at some 2016/17 deliverables outlined in the Annexure of Programme Performance Information that was part of the Budget Policy Statement recently discussed in Parliament.
For the record, the total estimated “procurement value” in national government for 2016/17 is about Sh1.1 trillion.
To begin, the Presidency plans to implement two separate management information systems – one on surcharge, the other on performance (why these should be separate systems is unclear).
At the same time, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) promises to disrupt 50 corruption networks (up from eight in 2014/15 and a target of 43 in the current fiscal year), while Treasury’s allocation for preparing the 2016/17 budget is, at Sh200 million, twice the previous (current) year’s cost.
Using a “vendor-driven” lens, let’s tease out a few “money minting opportunities” from the actual performance information.
The Kenya Police expects to acquire 2,500 vehicles and four aircraft (although the Treasury itself only plans to lease 800 vehicles).
The Ministry of Interior plans to acquire 500 vehicles for deputy and assistant county commissioners, and 500 motorcycles for chiefs and assistant chiefs, while rehabilitating 20 security airstrips.
Kenya Prisons will build 101 staff houses, 55 prisoner wards and 11 multi-purpose dining halls. The Department of Transport will acquire two new ferries while the that of Infrastructure will build 5,000 kilometres (km) of road and maintain another 55,000 km.
The Ministry of Energy will drill 14 geothermal wells and 30 coal wells while promising to bring onto grid over 1,000 megawatts of new power.
The Department of Agriculture will build 12 livestock sale yards, two haysheds, two post-harvest storage sites and four agricultural machine testing centres, while purchasing 130,000 tonnes of fertilisers, 13,000 tonnes of rice, one million bags of maize and 800,000 bags of beans.
The Judiciary will build a new Supreme Court, 11 high courts and three magistrates courts, rehabilitate 41 high courts and magistrates courts.
The Treasury will roll out IFMIS to 50 sub-county treasuries and 60 parastatals and public universities, while spending Sh300 million to get its proposed new digital payment platform in place.
We aren’t even counting the multitude of policies, laws, regulations, reports, action plans, conferences, exhibitions, workshops and sundry events planned across all of government.
Even without budget data, this is a vendor’s dream. But it’s also a planning, budgeting and performance management nightmare.
At least however, the advent of programme-based budgeting (PBB) – as now required by law - means we are (hopefully) no longer buying “air”. The OMB would sit in exactly the right place to make PBB work.
So there we have it – the missing potential of digital government supported by a president’s budget.
