Kisumu County has received an overall 50 per cent rating in a governance assessment being conducted under the third phase of the County Peer Review Mechanism (CPRM) by the Kenyan secretariat of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development, NEPAD.
The assessment, which seeks to establish how residents view the performance of their county government, placed Kisumu among the better-performing counties reviewed so far, according to Ambassador Rukia Subow, a member of the CPRM Panel of Eminent Persons.
Subow said although the overall county rating stood at 50 per cent, some wards and areas had recorded higher scores, with residents giving positive assessments in several sectors, including health and public participation.
“Kisumu has been the best so far, and also Murang’a,” Subow said during the validation exercise in Kisumu on Monday.
She said the exercise was not intended merely to give counties a score but to establish whether the findings collected from residents accurately reflected their experiences with county services.
The CPRM is a home-grown participatory self-assessment framework designed to help county governments identify governance strengths, service delivery challenges and areas requiring improvement.
It is anchored on peer learning, mutual accountability and dialogue between county governments and citizens.
The third phase follows data collection through focus group discussions conducted in May, June and July, during which residents gave their views on the implementation of devolved functions at the ward level.
The current phase involves validating those findings at the sub-county level before the final reports and recommendations are adopted.
NEPAD/APRM chairperson, Sospeter Ojaamong said the team had spent time collecting views from members of the public and was now returning to the communities to verify whether the information captured in the preliminary report represented their experiences.
“This is what we have come to do today to validate what we have been doing,” he said.
Ojaamong said the exercise would run for about a week in Kisumu, after which findings from participating counties would be taken through a peer review process where counties would learn from each other and identify best practices and gaps in governance.
The validation process is designed to strengthen the credibility of the assessment by allowing residents to confirm, challenge or add to the preliminary findings.
The exercise targets people who participated in the earlier focus group discussions and brings together representatives of different sections of society, including women, youth, boda boda operators, traders, artisans, faith-based organisations, civil society, persons with disabilities, farmers, academia and Nyumba Kumi representatives.
Principal Secretary for Economic Planning Boniface Makokha said the County Peer Review Mechanism was a domesticated application of the African Peer Review Mechanism and offered citizens an opportunity to directly provide feedback on the performance of their governments.
He said such feedback was important because it enabled governments to identify sectors where they were performing well while exposing areas where improvements were needed.
“If citizens tell you that you are doing well in public participation, health or education, that is constructive feedback that helps any government, whether national or county, to plan well,” Makori said.
He said the CPRM was voluntary, with counties choosing to subject themselves to the assessment to identify their strengths and weaknesses.
Makori said the process also supported accountability, service delivery and citizen participation by putting residents at the centre of governance.
Subow said the assessment covered 14 thematic areas handled by county governments, with the views of residents forming the basis of the ratings.
She said the process went beyond simply asking residents whether they were satisfied with county leadership, with assessors seeking specific evidence of service delivery.
In health, for instance, residents were asked about the availability of medicines, equipment and access to services at lower levels rather than relying solely on the existence of facilities.
She said residents could also identify gaps that may not be immediately visible from county-level statistics, such as the need to bring specialised services closer to communities.
“Some of them might say we want screening here because we cannot go too far. It is a bit far, and people don’t have that money to stay in hotels,” she said.
The validation exercise therefore provides an opportunity for such concerns to be incorporated into the final county assessment.
According to the CPRM, the validation phase is expected to produce county review reports that reflect grassroots experiences and recommendations while strengthening local ownership of governance assessments.
The exercise is being conducted in eight counties between August 24 and September 4, with Kisumu, Homa Bay, Migori and Meru among the first counties undergoing validation.
Kisumu has 35 wards and seven sub-counties covered by the exercise.
Subow said the findings from the validation exercise would be consolidated into a broader report for discussion during a peer review conference expected in October.
The process, she said, would allow counties to learn from one another and develop solutions to governance and service delivery gaps identified through the assessment.
The CPRM is ultimately expected to strengthen transparency, accountability and participatory governance while improving county policymaking and service delivery.
