The government has rolled out the Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS) asset and inventory module to counties as part of a nationwide push to digitise public assets and tighten accountability in resource management.
Public Investments and Assets Management Principal Secretary (PS) Cyrell Odede said the move was aimed at ensuring accurate asset registers, uniform reporting standards, and improved safeguarding of public resources.
“This is not just a technical upgrade. It is a fundamental shift towards greater accuracy, enhanced safeguarding of public resources, and uniform reporting standards across the public sector,” he said.
Speaking in Kisumu on Friday during the conclusion of a week-long sensitisation workshop for county officers from Migori, Homa Bay, Kakamega, Busia. Kisumu, Nyamira and Siaya, the PS directed counties to urgently submit names of their official IFMIS users for mapping into the system.
He further asked the devolved units to fast-track documentation such as title deeds for public assets and embrace innovative revenue-generating strategies including leveraging roads for advertising.
“Public assets should not lie dormant. They must be leveraged to generate revenue for service delivery,” he said.
The PS said the National Government had already implemented the IFMIS fixed asset module in 2023/24, with all state departments uploading their asset data.
County governments, he said, were now expected to replicate the same commitment to ensure the new measures are applied across the two levels of government.
He added that all public entities were required to transition from cash to accrual-based accounting by the year 2027, a shift that makes accurate digital asset registers more urgent.
Under the Public Finance Management Act, county accounting officers are legally mandated to maintain current, reliable asset registers accessible to the county treasury and Auditor-General.Odede urged counties to allocate dedicated budgets for asset management, including training to sustain the reforms, saying digitisation was central to prudent financial management.
“The process of securing all public assets such as title deeds must be done. This is because secure ownership is the legal foundation upon which all effective asset management is built,” he said.
By Chris Mahandara
