Mombasa — The Nairobi County Finance and Economic Planning Sector held a week long workshop with County staff heading major revenue streams to develop revenue enhancement strategies, work plan, policy and revenue administration for Nairobi Revenue Authority Structure.
"This NRA is going to be just like any other organisation, with a leadership, a management and staff and this being a new organisation, there is bound to be anxieties and uncertainties. You cannot also have a well structured organisation with technical people insisting on doing management work or vice versa, there has to be a clear structure where everyone's' role is defined and followed," Finance County Executive Charles Kerich stated.
County Chief Officer for Revenue Administration, Wilson Gakuya said that the County has registered a remarkable improvement in revenue performance in the second half financial year despite teething problems of the revenue collection system.
In addition, the County Own Source of Revenue (OSR) in the last 5 months,January to May 2023, has grown by more than Ksh. 1.4 billion compared to a similar period in the last Financial Year.
Chief Gakuya explained that in order to enhance Countys' Own Source of Revenue, the County had to fundamentally change how it runs its affairs in revenue administration.
Stated Mr. Gakuya "One of the deliverables in the Performance Contract was implementation of Nairobi Revenue Authority (NRA). In order to promote efficiency, effectiveness, transparency and accountability in county revenue, the County under the stewardship of H.E the Governor, is in the process of establishing a Nairobi Revenue Authority (NRA)".
He further said that the Revenue Authority will be a game changer in the way Revenue Administration is done that will see some of the perennial challenges in revenue administration addressed.
County Head of Revenue, Nixon Otieno explained that the implementation of the NRA will not be an event rather, a journey that everyone needs to embrace and walk together as a team and that all inputs will be taken into account.
County Director for Revenue, Shaban Asman said " This workshop is very important towards the establishment of the NRA particularly because of the involvement of the revenue stream heads who will play a critical role of implementing the revenue enhancement strategies and policies."
He added that when doing a structure, one must critically look at three areas ; what has worked before should be reinforced; what has not worked should be discontinued and what is needed to improve and prosper.
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The Revenue team led by Ms. Anastaciah Githuba, asked the participants to question themselves while sharing their input as to whether the Revenue Authority the County is creating is speaking to the people and if their lives would improve.
She further said "As NRA, its product is facilitation; making it easy for that person to understand how to meet their obligation. It is meant to simplify things for the clients to support it fully".
The participants shared their inputs during group activities on strategies for revenue mobilisation, NRA structure, staff establishment, target alignment to the structure, job descriptions and NRA overall strategy document on vision, mission, OSR enhancement and code of ethics.
In attendance was Economic Affairs Advisor, Governor's Office, Larry Wambua and County staff heading major revenue streams.
