STATEMENT BY HIS EXCELLENCY HON. UHURU KENYATTA, C.G.H.

, PRESIDENT AND COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF THE DEFENCE FORCES OF THE REPUBLIC OF KENYA ON THE OCCASION OF THE SWEARING-IN OF PRINCIPAL SECRETARIES, STATE HOUSE, NAIROBI, JUNE, 2013 Ladies and Gentlemen, I am pleased to preside over your swearing-in as Principal Secretaries. I congratulate you on your appointment in what was a competitive, rigorous and transparent process and wish you great success in discharging your duties. As you will recall, during my inauguration, I pledged to focus on quality service delivery and efficient utilization of public resources as the basis of national development. In order to achieve this goal, competent, experienced and hard working men and women of integrity are required. As the appointing authority, I took painstaking efforts to recommend to Parliament the best people in the positions that best suit their competencies. I am glad that you have all succeeded through the vetting process and have now been sworn into office. My expectation is that you will neither disappoint me nor the people of Kenya. I urge you to vindicate the faith and confidence the people of Kenya and I have on you by serving diligently and accountably in order to deliver the transformation of our country that Kenyans desire. Ladies and Gentlemen, As I pointed out during the swearing-in of Cabinet Secretaries mid last month, our Constitution outlines the key values and principles of the public service. These include efficient, effective and economic use of resources; responsive, impartial and equitable provision of services; accountability for administrative acts; and transparency and provision of timely and accurate information to the public. As the administrators of State Departments, we expect you to not only fully embrace these values and principles but also seek to entrench them in your various dockets. Indeed, the responsibility of ensuring that the Government is highly effective lies squarely in your hands as well as those of your respective Cabinet Secretaries. I urge you to work closely with and render your full support to your respective Cabinet Secretaries so that the Government can run seamlessly and deliver services to the people. To enhance the efficiency of public service institutions, you will be expected to put in place systems and processes that will ensure efficient service delivery, including service charters and performance contracts. I wish to put it on record that my Government will pay keen attention to the implementation of performance contracting, and as I pointed out recently, public servants who fail to deliver on performance targets have no business being in office. My Government will also pay very close attention to the prudent and accountable use of public resources. As the people in charge of State Departments, you are expected to ensure public finances and assets under your dockets are used transparently, accountably and strictly for the intended purposes. You must, therefore, institute immediate measures to seal all corruption loopholes and ensure that maximum value is derived from every tax shilling, for the benefit of our people. Ladies and Gentlemen, You have assumed office at a time when we are implementing the new Constitution. Indeed, you will serve as the midwives of the new dispensation envisaged in our Constitution. We, therefore, expect you to provide visionary leadership in aligning your departments with the requirements of the new Constitution. Finally, I urge you to ensure that service delivery is customer-oriented. Close attention must be paid to ordinary citizens who are the customers and beneficiaries of public services. On their part, Kenyans should join hands in fighting corruption. We must remember that corruption undermines service delivery and must be overcome if we are to succeed in developing our country.

I urge wananchi to particularly monitor the use of finances devolved to the counties. We must do all we can to ensure corruption is not devolved and thereby multiplied 47 times over. Should this happen, then the prospects for the development of our country will be very bleak indeed. I appeal to all those doing business with the national as well as county governments to observe high levels of integrity in order for us to ensure the available scarce resources are used prudently and productively for the good of our country and people. With these remarks, I once again congratulate you and wish you great success in your new appointments. Thank you and God bless you all.