Sincerely speaking, Counties in Kenya do not need governors, but instead they need Mayors. They are too small and they do not have populations great enough to qualify for governor leadership. An election or an appointment of a governor is dependent on the populations of those to be governed. In some instances, the size of an area also plays a role in an election or in an appointment of a governor. Apparently, Kenya copied the American structure of governance without examining some of the areas which did not fit in Kenya.
Was Kenya therefore justified to copy the entire USA kind of governance? It was absolutely wrong to copy everything blindly without first discussing some of those areas which were not appropriate for Kenya.
The USA is made up of 50 States. All those States are led by governors because of their sizes and because of their populations. Some of those States are almost twice the size of Kenya. They also host much larger populations than Kenya. In Kenya, Counties which are the same size as some of the towns governed by Mayors in USA, are led by Governors. A good example of such a town in USA is the New York City which is led by a Mayor, yet this City is greater and is more populated than most counties in Kenya which are currently led by governors.
Nairobi has a population of 3.375 million, Mombasa has a population of 1.2 million, Nakuru has a population of 1.603 million, Kisumu has a population of 968,879 and Eldoret has a population of 289,380, all of which make a total population of 7,436,259. The New York City alone, has a total population of 8.538 million which is slightly more than the total population of the 5 biggest cities in Kenya. In each of the Kenyan Cities there is a Governor yet the New York City which has a population more than the five combined cities, is led by a Mayor. What a Scenario?
The origin of that reasoning was not well researched.
The sizes of the governments in those counties in Kenya is the same size as some of the governments in some states in the USA. In simple terms, for the position of governors to be created in Kenya, Kenya equated its counties to States in the USA.
That was a totally blind decision which resulted to the unnecessary large governments, and hence a waste of resources.
Counties in Kenya do not need the supervision of a governor. All they need is an equivalence of a Mayor, because of their size in populations and in area.
Right now, most of those currently holding positions in the County governments, earn very big salaries for doing work which would be done by Kenyans earning much less salaries. It is a waste of money to have large governments in the counties led by governors.
At the same time, the governors in Kenya have been reported of being notorious for looting public funds. Kenyans have forgotten that their Kenyan Nation, was once led by a governor. It is high time those large structures of governance in counties are scrapped and replaced with smaller structures of governance which would render better services and at the same time reduce the total expenditure.
Dr. Isaac Newton Kinity.
