The State House and the Departments for Social Protection and Sports burst their full-year recurrent budgets by nearly Sh9.43 billion within the first 11 months, pointing to poor expenditure projections, which prompted additional cash allocation.
Exchequer records published last Friday by the National Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi show that the three offices had withdrawn more cash than what had been budgeted for the entire fiscal year by the end of May.
The out-of-budget expenditure appeared to go against an earlier undertaking by the Treasury to reject additional cash requests beyond approved amounts, save for security and education dockets.
The State Department for Social Protection and Senior Citizens Affairs spent nearly Sh6.47 billion above the full-year budget, according to Treasury's data on cash inflows and outflows from the government's main account.
That was after its recurrent expenditures, largely cash transfers to the elderly and orphans, amounted to Sh39.82 billion compared with Sh33.35 billion approved by legislators.
The State House, on the other hand, burst its full-year budget by Sh1.46 billion on the back of increased disbursements under “operations and maintenance”, with the spending for the 11 months hitting Sh9.43 billion against approved full-year estimates of Sh7.96 billion.
Expenditures by the Sports department exceeded budget by nearly Sh1.5 billion as the government raced to pay for the hosting rights for the African Nations Championship (Chan), which is set to start on August 2, 2025, and end on August 30, 2025, and meet the requirements set by Confederation African Football (Caf).
Chan is a biennial football tournament organised by Caf since 2009 and first announced in September 2007.
The Sports docket received Sh2.36 billion for recurrent expenses, 173.33 percent more than the Sh863.81 billion full-year budget.
Article 223 of the Constitution, operationalised through Section 36(9) of the Public Finance Management (National Government) Regulations, enables State offices to spend as much as 10 percent above the cash ceiling approved by the National Assembly.
The Constitution requires the Treasury to table in the House a mini-budget two months after the withdrawal of unbudgeted money from the Consolidated Fund without the approval of the members of parliament.
The PFM regulations, however, bar legislators from approving a supplementary budget that exceeds 10 percent of "the approved budget estimates of a programme or sub-vote unless it is for unforeseen and unavoidable need".
Mr Mbadi has already sought approval from lawmakers for Sh33.96 billion for 13 State departments, with Sh23.22 billion of the cash having already been disbursed between April 4 and June 17.
The biggest gainer of the mini-budget is the Social Protection Department, which already received Sh10.28 billion above budget between May 15 and May 15 towards cash transfers under the Inua Jamii programme for elderly persons and orphans, according to the Parliamentary Budget Office.
The Treasury is also seeking to regularise Sh1.79 billion wired to the State House on May 15, May 30, and June 17 for operations and maintenance, while the Sports Department got Sh1.68 billion for Chan hosting rights on April 4.
Members of the public have in the past shone the spotlight on the rising number of State departments exceeding their allocation.
The last financial year ended June 2024, for instance, 30 State departments and agencies had their recurrent budgets reviewed upwards by Sh57.26 billion, pointing to inherent poor projections in expenditure plans.
The successful requests for additional cash, granted through two supplementary budgets, largely hit payment of retired public servants and disbursements of equitable shares to the counties.
Payment of pension and gratuity to retirees — a priority disbursement under Public Finance Management law — fell short of the targeted budget by Sh40.14 billion to Sh148.95 billion, while counties received Sh30.83 billion less than Sh385.42 billion for the year ended June 2024.
As a result, the Treasury got approval from lawmakers to carry over payments of Sh30.8 billion to the current fiscal year ending this month despite heightened budget cuts after the plan for new and higher taxes collapsed.
In response to public concerns over growing out-of-budget expenditure, the Treasury wrote in an outlook paper for the last financial year: "In order to maintain the primary balance consistent with the fiscal consolidation path, expenditures have to be maintained at the levels approved in printed estimates."
It added: "In this respect, additional spending pressures will be accommodated within the approved ceilings that are reallocation possibilities, except those of the security and education sectors."
Besides State House, Sports and Social Protection dockets, other departments that got emergency funding under Article 223 of the Constitution are the Treasury, which was given Sh5 billion for leasing police vehicles on May 28.
Others are the National Intelligence Service (Sh1.7 billion on June 4 and June 13) and Interior (Sh1.5 billion on May 21 and 30, and June 17) for security operations.
