Nyeri Governor Mutahi Kahiga has denied claims that his administration employs 102 rat catchers, terming the figure exaggerated.

Appearing before the Senate County Public Accounts Committee on Thursday to answer questions about the 2019/2020 expenditure, the governor clarified that the county has one or two rat catchers on its payroll.

"We were discussing the wage bill...counties inherited a huge work force during the transition, " Kahiga told the committee.

He added: "I did say that in my own payroll, I have one or two rat catchers, I have two meter readers. These are people we inherited from the Nyeri municipal council and we could not send them away, we could not sack them." 

Governor Kahiga pointed out that a large segment of the county’s workforce was inherited from local authorities given that Nyeri served as the provincial headquarters for the Central region before the 2010 constitution.

Nyeri is among the counties that are grappling with a ballooned wage bill, with the county paying Sh3,592,854,332 in salaries, representing 52% of total revenue of Sh6,956,824,044.

The expenditure exceeded the 35% limit set by Regulation 25 (1) (b) of the Public Finance Management (County Governments) Regulations, 2015.

The governor defended the huge wage bill, claiming there were no ECDE teachers when he took over the county’s leadership and has since hired 800.

"This is not a recurrent expenditure, this is a development for Nyeri.... we hire because a need, because a service is being provided," he said.

"When PMF talks about 35 percent of revenue not being spent on personal emoluments, that is an arbitrary statement made by some people who may need to have a better understanding of what is happening on the ground.”