The Controller of Budget Margaret Nyakango’s office has lost nearly a billion shillings from her estimate for the next financial year after her budget was reduced to Sh777.5 million.

She told the Senate that the reduction for the financial year 2025/2026 from Sh1.6 billion to Sh777.5 million will affect essential services and petitioned MPs to assist her get more funds.

Nyakang’o also told the Senate that the government plans to pay all pending bills worth Sh704.59 billion to national and county governments during the 2025/2026 financial year.

She said the pending bills at the national and county governments stand at Sh524.07 billion and Sh180.52 billion respectively. She said this will mitigate the losses realised by businesses that have provided goods and services to the government in the past.

“The Controller of Budget has continued to enforce compliance among county governments by requiring that they submit pending bills payment plans at the beginning of every financial year in line with the National Treasury circular,” said Nyakango.

In her office, Ms Nyakango said it will be a challenge to cater for salaries and allowances for all staff and remit contributions to the pension scheme and implement a new staffing grading structure in her office, which had a deficit of Sh182.8 million in approved but unfunded positions.

She said she required an additional Sh167.5 million for public participation, stakeholder engagements in public forums and county supervision.

Her other activities include parliamentary visits, internal audits, county and regional visits, monitor the budgeting cycle, and maintain exchequer records. “To cater for benchmarking to enable officers learn from countries with robust oversight mechanisms on budget implementation processes and attend specialised training and international conferences we require additional funding of Sh15.3 million,” said Nyakango.

She revealed that for the six years she has served in that position, she has never travelled outside the country in official capacity due to constrained resources save for when she joined the National Treasury team for a one week benchmarking tour to Tanzania.

Nyakango said her office requires an additional Sh182 million to recruit new staff and promote those in office since currently each county has got one officer who cannot go on leave. She said to cater for the printing of Quarterly National Government Budget Implementation Review reports, Quarterly County Budget Implementation Review reports, Annual reports and financial statements they require an additional Sh117.1 million.

“To automate systems, develop and deploy the Controller of Budget Management Information System, and manage Exchequer Requisitions efficiently, an additional Sh51.4 million is needed to purchase ICT equipment,” said Nyakango.

For staff training and capacity building they require an additional Sh51 million. For monitoring and evaluation expenses, bank charges, staff membership subscriptions to professional bodies, legal fees, and contracted professional services, they require additional Sh89.4 million.

Kakamega Senator Boni Khalwale lauded Nyakango for good work and asked whether she has engaged with the Salaries and Remuneration Commission over remuneration of staff in her office.

Kisii Senator Richard Onyonka supported calls for additional allocation to the budgets of the offices of Controller of Budget and the Auditor General in recognition of their critical roles to ensure prudent expenditure of public funds.