Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja has pledged to protect the constitutional mandate granted to his office, ruling out any transfer of county functions while affirming the need for structured collaboration with the National Government.
Speaking amid renewed debate over the management of the capital, Sakaja said he would uphold the trust bestowed upon him by city residents and safeguard devolution.
“I honour the mandate the people of Nairobi gave me. They entrusted me with constitutional powers to transform the city. I will not betray that trust,” he said.
The governor pointed to the 2020 transfer of key county functions to the Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS) as a costly undertaking that he claimed undermined the county government and left behind significant financial and administrative challenges.
“In the year 2020, Nairobi got into a misadventure that ended up being costly. The NMS experiment left us with a 16 billion hole in pending bills, low staff morale due to mistreatment and a defilement of devolution,” Sakaja said.
The NMS was established following a deed of transfer that handed over critical functions, including health, transport, public works and planning to the National Government.
The arrangement was later reversed, with the functions reverting to the county administration.
Sakaja maintained that the constitutional framework governing devolution must be respected and that Nairobi County would retain its legally assigned responsibilities.
“The functions bestowed upon us by the Constitution will remain County functions. We shall not transfer them,” he stated.
At the same time, the governor acknowledged the unique status of Nairobi as the country’s capital city, saying cooperation between the two levels of government remains necessary.
“Nairobi is not just a county; it is the capital city and collaboration with the National Government is inevitable; in fact it is encouraged,” he said.
His remarks come at a time when discussions around service delivery, fiscal management and intergovernmental relations in the capital continue to dominate public discourse.
