Public private partnerships by local authorities in kenya: legal and policy lessons for county governments

Abstract

Public Private Partnerships (herein after referred to as PPPs) are widely becoming modes of service delivery both in Kenya and around the world. Governments are increasingly turning to the private sector for the delivery of infrastructure services. The United Nations Economic Council for Europe (UNECE) has acknowledged that PPPs in the delivery of public service have become a phenomenon which is spreading in the globe and generating great interest.' In general terms, a PPP means an institutional relationship between the state and the private for-profit and/or the private not for-profit sector, where the different public and private sector actors jointly participate in defining the objectives, the methods and the implementation of co-operation in development." PPPs are thus arrangements between the government or government agencies and private sector entities for the purposes of providing public infrastructure, community facilities and related services. Local Authorities in Kenya (LAs) and especially the City Council of Nairobi and the Mombasa Municipality have in the recent past embraced PPPs and have partnered with private entities in provision of services. Research has however shown that implementation of PPPs by LAs in Kenya has been done without proper appreciation of the nature of PPPs resulting into challenges to the PPPs with adverse effects to the private actors and the public as well, being the consumers of the services and works. Francis Fukuyama has observed that 'while privatization involves a reduction in the scope of state functions, it requires functioning markets and high degree of state capacity and commitment to lmplernent'"