Ipsos research analyst Tom Wolf at the company's office in Nairobi on February 13, 2017. PHOTO | FILE | NATION MEDIA GROUP
6.April 2018
A majority of Kenyans support devolution, a survey has revealed.
According to the survey released by Ipsos Synovate on Friday, 84 per cent of Kenyans support devolution with only 13 per cent opposing it. Four per cent of Kenyans who took part in the survey are not sure whether they support devolution or not.
Interestingly, the survey revealed that more Nasa supporters back county governments at 86 per cent than Jubilee Party supporters (83 per cent).
In 2014, months after the first county governments started working, only 69 per cent of the population supported it.
But since then, the support has increased with the highest ever recorded support before this being 82 per cent in 2015.
“In 2014 the support stood at 69 per cent rising to 82 per cent a year later. This then dipped slightly to 77 per cent in 2016 and to 73 per cent in 2017, but the percentage has shot up to 84 per cent,” said Tom Wolf, the lead researcher at Ipsos.
The survey, conducted between March 4 and 12, further revealed that more people from the Coast support devolution than any other part of the country followed Nyanza and Eastern regions with 90 per cent, 88 per cent and 85 per cent, respectively.
Rift Valley, Nairobi, Central and Western regions also scored highly at 83 per cent, 82 per cent, 81 per cent and 80 per cent, respectively, while in North Eastern it had the least support at 75 per cent.
Governors also scored with 50 per cent of Kenyans having a lot of confidence in their leadership and 26 per cent having some confidence. Only 13 percent have no confidence in them.
However, a majority of Kenyans hold the view that health services should be the responsibility of the national government and not the county governments with 44 per cent of those interviewed saying that the function should remain with the former against 36 per cent for the latter.
Forty-four per cent of Jubilee supporters say the function should revert to the national government, while 43 per cent of Nasa supporters agree with them.
The same is true on the regional front with seven out of the eight regions saying that the service should have remained with the national government except for North Eastern where 64 per cent of respondents say it should be handled jointly by both governments and only 14 per cent saying it should return to the national government.
More Nasa supporters hold the view that health services should be devolved at 37 per cent, a percentage point more than Jubilee supporters.
Eighteen per cent of Kenyans believe health services should be the main responsibility of both governments.
Despite the overwhelming support for devolution, many Kenyans, however, would like their county governments to improve roads, water, employment and education services.
Human rights and constitutional violations also came into focus with citizens citing extra-judicial killings, bribery or extortion by government officials as some of top the violations at 19 per cent and 12 percent, respectively.
Disobeying of court orders and arrest and deportation of Miguna Miguna topped the list of violations of the Constitution and the rule of law with 24 per cent and 11 per cent, respectively.
With Kenya looking to the East, a majority of Kenyans are in support of the government’s economic policy with more citizens (34 per cent) backing relations with China than USA (26 per cent).
The survey interviewed 2,003 individuals above 18 years living in urban and rural areas from across 45 counties using random and multi-stage stratified sampling method.
The interviews were done face to face in three languages, Kiswahili, English and Somali, with the survey having a 16 per cent sampling error and a 95 per cent confidence level.
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