Seven State departments exhausted their full-year recurrent budget allocations in less than nine months, underscoring mounting pressure on public finances and partly prompting the Treasury to seek an additional Sh206.12 billion to fund day-to-day government operations.
Treasury data show the departments – spanning the presidency, security, social protection and health – had already exceeded their original full-year recurrent allocations by the end of March 2026.
Recurrent spending covers salaries and allowances, operations and maintenance, administrative costs, and transfers such as pensions and social benefits.
During the nine months to March 2026, total recurrent expenditure rose 18.16 percent year-on-year to Sh1.17 trillion, from Sh991.75 billion in a similar period last year and Sh905.78 billion in the same period of the 2023/24 financial year.
As a result, lawmakers revised the recurrent budget for the year ending June to nearly Sh1.68 trillion from the initial Sh1.47 trillion – an increase of Sh206.12 billion.
Early exhaustion
The depletion of annual allocations three months before the financial year-end points to significant in-year adjustments and raises concerns over budget credibility.
This comes as the Treasury maintains that reforms are underway to rein in costs and improve efficiency. In the 2026 Budget Policy Statement, it said the government ‘continues to implement measures to enhance expenditure control and ensure value for money in public spending’.
The measures include austerity steps to curb recurrent spending, rollout of end-to-end e-procurement systems to boost transparency, governance reforms in State corporations, including privatization, and deployment of a Human Resource Management System across national and county governments to better manage the wage bill.
Among the most striking cases is the State Department for Special Programmes, whose full-year recurrent allocation rose sharply from Sh488 million to Sh13.8 billion.
By March, the department had spent Sh6.9 billion, reflecting the cost of responding to climate-related emergencies, including deadly mudslides in Elgeyo Marakwet last November and drought-driven famine in parts of northern Kenya. The scale of the increase highlights how unplanned shocks can rapidly alter spending priorities.
Spending at State House also expanded sharply, with its annual budget more than doubling from Sh7.68 billion to Sh16.25 billion.
Treasury data show Sh12.33 billion had been disbursed to State House by the end of March, representing 60.55 percent or Sh4.65 billion more than the original full-year allocation.
Opaque spending
The single largest increase came under the broad and often opaque ‘other operating expenses’ vote, which was boosted by Sh4 billion through in-year adjustments to Sh5.94 billion, from an initially approved Sh1.94 billion. This renews concerns over transparency in how such funds are utilised.
The Office of the Deputy President similarly saw its allocation rise from Sh2.97 billion to Sh5.06 billion, having spent Sh3.82 billion in less than nine months in recurrent expenses.
Security-related expenditure was also a major driver of in-year cash demands. The State Department for Internal Security and National Administration had gobbled up Sh33.26 billion with more than three months left in the financial year. This prompted a revision of its full-year budget from Sh31.7 billion to Sh48.2 billion, reflecting sustained operational demands but also persistent pressure on recurrent spending.
The State Department for Social Protection and Senior Citizens Affairs spent Sh30.28 billion by March, exceeding its original full-year allocation of Sh29.03 billion.
Similarly, the State Department for Public Health and Professional Standards surpassed its initial full-year budget of Sh17.57 billion, spending Sh20.78 billion in nine months.
The Sports department also posted a notable overrun, with spending reaching Sh4.67 billion against an original allocation of just over Sh1 billion. This reflects the $30 million (Sh3.88 billion) paid to the Confederation of African Football (CAF) as hosting rights fee for the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon). This prompted a revision of its recurrent budget to Sh5.08 billion.