Influence of citizens’ involvement on governance of projects in devolved governments in Kenya

Abstract

Projects are more than a set of actions as they are the principal ways of creating change and dealing with change in the modern society for better livelihood of the citizens. The need of governance exists not only at national level but also at county level. Citizens’ involvement is presumed that if government officials and citizens work collaboratively to determine and prioritize community needs, then public policies and government actions are likely to reflect the contributions and wishes of the public. As a result of such interactions and collaborative action, communities are assumed to have the capacity to engage their government to articulate concerns and solve problems. This study analyzed the influence of citizens’ involvement on governance of projects in county governments in Kenya. The specific objectives of this study were: to establish the perception citizens had on governance of projects; to examine citizens’ engagement on governance of projects; to determine the level of citizen participation on governance of projects; to assess democratic practice on governance of projects and to examine legal framework guiding citizen involvement on governance of projects at the county governments in Kenya. Cluster sampling and systematic random sampling techniques were used to utilize in drawing a representative sample from the population. Questionnaires and interview schedule were the instruments used in the collection of primary data. A sample of 400 respondents was used. The statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) version 20 was used to run the analysis; SERVQUAL model, factor analysis and multinomial regression analysis were used to analyze the quantitative data. The hypotheses was tested using ANOVA and F test to show whether to reject or fail to reject the null hypothesis at the significance level of 0.05. The study found out that the expectations of the respondents were their interests to be met by the service providers. In the level of participation the study found out that they were at the tokenism. Majority of them had participated in democratic practice. The study rejected three null hypotheses and failed to reject two null hypotheses. It concluded that perceptions towards participation ought to be noticed that the enthusiasm or hesitance of people to take part in county government is firmly subject to their expectations. The contribution towards the citizen engagement was the project plan that should highlight key authorization points and tie with the schedule for meetings and other stakeholders’ engagement points. Governance of project evolves during the life of a project, and therefore it should be reviewed regularly as it moves from one phase to another. Policy formulation and implementation need to involve the majority of the citizens. The study recommended citizens to participate in all levels and the need for citizen empowerment and access to information for effective participation as partners in decision-making processes.