Kemnac president Sheikh Juma Ngao in Mombasa on Friday /BRIAN OTIENO
A Muslim organisation has opposed a Bill that proposes the scrapping of regional development authorities.
The Kenya Muslim National Advisory Council (Kemnac) wants coastal and other MPs to reject the proposed Regional Development Authorities Laws (Repeal) Bill, 2026, which seeks to dissolve all six regional development authorities.
These include the Coast Development Authority (CDA), the Kerio Valley Development Authority (KVDA), the Lake Basin Development Authority (LBDA), the Tana and Athi Rivers Development Authority (Tarda), the Ewaso Ng'iro South Development Authority and the Ewaso Ng'iro North Development Authority.
Kemnac president Sheikh Juma Ngao said on Friday that doing away with the development authorities, especially the CDA, would risk development, particularly at the Coast, where industries died long ago and need revival.
“One of the reasons propagated for wanting to dissolve the regional development authorities is the mismanagement of funds,” Ngao said.
“Our stand as a council is, if there was embezzlement of funds, it is not a problem of the institutions, but of the managers of those institutions. Thus, arrest those managers and let the institutions be.”
He said dissolving an institution like the CDA because of its managers was wrong and an insult to the people of the Coast and other regions.
Ngao said it would be unfair to the Coast region, in particular, to dissolve the CDA because the region had suffered the loss of other industries that used to benefit coastal people.
He said industries and entities such as the Ramisi sugar factory, the Bixa industry, the cashew nut industry and the Kenya National Petroleum Refinery had been lost, and dissolving the CDA would be a step too far for the coastal region.
“We will not sit and watch this happen,” he said.
He criticised political leaders from the Coast region for staying quiet while industries in their region were being lost.
“This proposal was tabled in the National Assembly but our leaders are quiet. There is not a word about it. Why?” he posed.
The Bill was sponsored by National Assembly Majority Leader Kimani Ichung'wah and gazetted on June 5, 2026.
If passed, it will repeal the individual Acts of Parliament that established each of the six institutions.
Under the proposal, the National Treasury and the Public Service Commission (PSC) are set to absorb the major operations, staff and balance sheets of all six regional development authorities.
The PSC will meanwhile assume responsibility for employees currently serving in the six authorities.
According to the memorandum accompanying the Bill, the repeal is intended to wind up institutions that have already fulfilled the mandate for which they were established, while aligning national development functions with the Fourth Schedule.
The Government also argues that eliminating the authorities will ease pressure on the national budget while improving efficiency, accountability and service delivery through consolidation under existing institutions.
However, Kemnac said Kenya’s long-term plan should consider reviving industries, especially at the Coast, rather than losing more of them.
Kemnac vice president Abubakar Amin said coastal political leaders were too engrossed in the broad-based government narrative and had forgotten the people who put them in those seats in Parliament.
Amin said that a while back, there was a proposal to create a Coconut Board of Kenya, but the proposal was swiftly rejected by the powers that be, who argued the mandate of the board would be a repetition since that mandate was with the Agriculture and Food Authority.
“Yet, in other regions, there are the Coffee Board of Kenya, the Tea Board of Kenya, the Pyrethrum Board, among others. Aren’t the mandates of these boards also in the AFA?
“Our leaders are being taken for granted and yet they remain silent much to the disadvantage of the people of the Coast region,” the Kemnac vicev president said.
Amin said coastal residents needed to elect better leaders who would fight for them and not their own stomachs.
Sheikh Juma Ngao said it was appalling that all the political leaders of the region remained silent while their assets and resources were taken away from them.
“How much did each of them receive to stay silent? All the six governors are silent, same to all the six woman representatives, senators, and all elected and nominated MPs," the Muslim cleric said.
"Why are you all silent when the CDA, one of the last remaining parastatals in the region, wants to be dissolved?”
He urged National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula to ensure the Bill was not passed for the benefit of the six regions where these parastatals are.
The Kemnac chairperson said if coastal political leaders had joined UDA and were filling their stomachs without caring about the people they represented, then they had no business being in the positions they held.
He said if nothing was done about the Bill in the next two weeks, Kemnac would move to court to stop it.
“What sinister plans does this UDA government have for the Coast region? If this is the Tutam people are singing about, then we say no!” Ngao said.
He said there was a systemic plan against the Coast region by successive regimes, arguing that a ministry like the Mining, Blue Economy and Maritime Affairs had been underfunded.
