Feature: The Brain behind the splendid County Assembly of Homa Bay.

                           The Inside of the Chambers of the New Homa Bay County Assembly.

             Homa Bay County Assembly Clerk Bob Kephas Otieno in his office-Photos By Dickson Odhiambo.


By Dickson Odhiambo.

January 30, 2018.

The Brain behind the splendid County Assembly of Homa Bay.

A visit to Homa Bay County within Nyanza region ushers one into a vast County with 40 wards represented by 40 elected Members of the County Assembly.

What is unique about the County which is number 43 in terms of ranking the counties in this country is the seat of its County Assembly which is rightly located at the now defunct Homa Bay County Council offices.

The Building was officially opened by the then Colonial Governor Sir Patrick Rennison in 1962 before Kenya got its independence from Britain in December 1963.

It first served as the offices of the then larger South Nyanza County Council under Elisha Aketch Chieng as the chairman and later as the offices of Homa Bay County Council until 2013 when devolution was ushered in following the March 4, 2013 General elections.

The building has been renovated and extended to accommodate the new County Assembly of Homa Bay.

The now refurbished building which is rightly opposite the Homa Bay law Court is one of its own as and now houses the new County Assembly of Homa Bay where the 40 elected MCAs and their 20 nominated counterparts legislate, represent and do the oversight role.

The New Assembly was officially opened by the National Super Alliance Leader Raila Odinga in February 2016.

To begin with, the success of having the new County Assembly of Homa Bay at the refurbished building is attributed to the Clerk of the Assembly Bob Kephas Otieno and his team of competent staff who have ensured that they have a County Assembly which ranks second after Kilifi County Assembly in Coast region.

Otieno says when he was first posted as the Clerk to the County Assembly in 2014 little did he know that he has an enormous task ahead of him as the Chief Executive Officer of the County Assembly which is the legislative wing of the County Government of Homa Bay head by Governor Cyprian Awiti.

Otieno who was seconded by then Transitional Authority as the pay roll manager in the County Government of Homa Bay in 2013 says when he was now employed as the new Clerk of the County Assembly from the executive wing of the County Government in March 2014, it was not an easy ride as his major work was to improve on the infrastructure and train the employees on the new methods on how they could improve work at the county Assembly.

“In terms of security at the Assembly, we first constructed a perimeter wall and put biometric access control system as well as the CCTV Cameras which have greatly increase surveillance here,” he says.

He says this was done within a period of two years after which he embarked on reconstruction of the offices for the 84 staffs of the county Assembly as well as furnishing them with furniture.

The Clerk says after this, with the help of County Assembly Service Board, they now embarked on a serious work of reconstructing the new County Assembly which has a modern chamber with a new state-of-art Hanzard system coupled with good air conditioners.

He says the new Assembly has a capacity of accommodating 120 members who can sit comfortably while debating and following proceedings when the Assembly is in session, adding that the arrangement is very nice as the chairs are well fitted.

He adds that at the Assembly, there is a public gallery as a well as place for VIP to sit while following the proceedings of the Assembly whenever they visit.

“We also bought all the ICT equipment like desktops, laptops and all that appertains in improving communications at the Assembly during the proceedings,” he says.

Besides the hanzard equipment, Otieno says the Assembly has a new library which is fully functional, adding that its staff numbering 84 has also undergone several trainings so as to be able to cope up with demand of the devolution.

Otieno says they have also managed to improve the sewer and water system as well as doing landscaping at the Assembly, adding that they have also constructed four new offices which include the office of the clerk and other senior head of the departments. The offices are yet to be occupied by the said officers as the finishing work is still ongoing.

“We have also improved the official residence of the clerk of the County Assembly as well as doing a beautification at the county Assembly by planting some trees,” he adds.

He says all the works have a cost of about 200 million which they have used so far, adding that a lot has been done so far with the funds.

He says with the support of the County Assembly Service Board as well as the various committees within the Assembly, the Assembly has been able to move a notch higher.

He adds that various Government Agencies have now rated the Assembly as the second best after Kilifi County Assembly in Coast Region.

He adds that this has been so due to the splendid work done at the Assembly in terms of infrastructure, over 40 Bills passed so far as well as 12 Acts passed coupled with over 100 motions presented to the Assembly since the devolution kicked off in the year 2013.

Otieno says as from next month, the Assembly will go paperless as they have been able to purchase communication gadgets in form of Tablets for the MCAs to be used at the County Assembly as they do away with the paper work during the Sessions at the Assembly and during the various committees’ sittings.

He says as Assembly, there is no where it can be accused of mismanaging the funds since it has a fixed budget of 726 million in a financial year, adding that 500 million shillings is used for salaries of the staff while the remaining 226 million is for the allowances.

The Clerk says one of the future plans the Assembly has is to construct an official residence for the Speaker of the county Assembly at an estimated cost of shs 70 million.

The Homa Bay County Assembly Clerk Bob Kephas Otieno who is currently pursuing his PhD Degree in Strategic Management at the Maseno University begun from a humbly background as a technical teacher at Bumbe Technical Training Institute in Busia County after graduating with Diploma in Technical Education. Earlier he studied Diploma in Business Administration.

He then moved to then Yala Town Council in 2008 as an Administrative officer upon graduating with Higher Diploma in Human Resource from Kisumu National Polytechnic.

Otieno then worked at the Gucha County Council in 2009 as a Deputy Clerk after he attained his Bachelor of Commerce Degree from the Catholic university of Eastern Africa {CUEA}.

Between 2010 and 2012, he worked as a Deputy Clerk at Rachuonyo County Council after which he was seconded by the Transitional Authority as the payroll manager in the County Government of Homa Bay in 2013.

He took over as the Clerk of County Assembly of Homa Bay in March 2014 where he is to date after being employed from the Executive wing of the County Government of Homa Bay.

He obtained his Masters Degree in Strategic Management from Jaramogi Oginga Odinga University of Science and Technology {JOOUST} in the year 2016.

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