County water projects hit in 10-ministry budget cuts

Water ministry tops the list of 10 whose budgets have been cut after the Treasury slashed funds for constructing dams.

Additional amendments to the 2020/21 budget submitted to Parliament on May 14 show that Sh2. 5 billion meant for the dams was cut.

The affected dams include the Sh82 billion Thwake, Cross County Bulk Water and Sanitation— Ruiru, Nairobi Metro Area Bulk Water— Ruiru, Chemususu, Yamo, Siyoi — Muruny, Muache dam pipeline extension and National Water Harvesting and Ground Water Exploration.

Ruiru dam got the deepest cut of Sh705 million, Siyoi—Muruny has been reduced by Sh600 million. Thwake, Yamo and Chemususu have lost Sh200 million each.

The rest of the dam projects will lose between Sh60 million and Sh400 million.

The Treasury is seeking funds to finance President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Sh53.7 billion post-Covid-19 economic stimulus.

The 10 ministries will shed Sh8.3 billion from the intial allocation for financial year starting July 1.

Their budgets have been reduced from an initial allocation of Sh28.7 billion down to Sh20.4 billion.

The Ministry of Transport lost Sh1.2 billion meant for Lamu Port, South Sudan Ethiopia Transport (Lapsset).

The Lapsset corridor is Eastern Africa’s largest and most ambitious infrastructure project that consists of seven key projects.

Also suffering huge financial cuts are the ministries of Lands that lost Sh500 million for digitisation of registries, Energy (Sh1 billion) for electricity connectivity and Interior (Sh200) million meant for police and prisons housing.