The Cabinet Secretary for Gender, Culture and Children Services, Hanna Wendot Cheptumo appeared before the Senate plenary this Wednesday to answer questions concerning persistent underfunding and operational inefficiencies within her ministry, particularly in the newly established State Department for Children Services. The session, which was prompted by a set of questions from the Nominated Senator Miraj Abdilahi, drew considerable attention from lawmakers keen to understand how the government intends to improve the welfare and protection of Kenya’s children.

Senator Miraj opened the session by questioning the ministry’s commitment to addressing what she termed chronic underfunding of the Directorate of Children Services, now upgraded to a full State Department. She sought clarity on the budget estimates for the 2025/2026 financial year and the projected allocations in the medium term. In her response, CS Cheptumo acknowledged that the department had long suffered from inadequate financing, which had severely constrained its ability to safeguard the rights and welfare of children across the country.

“The Ministry fully recognises the long-standing challenge of underfunding,” said Cheptumo. “We have adopted a multi-pronged approach to ensure that child protection financing is mainstreamed into broader national planning and resource mobilisation frameworks.”

The Cabinet Secretary explained that her ministry had initiated high-level budget advocacy and consultations with the Departmental Committee on Social Protection of the National Assembly in May 2025. During those deliberations, the ministry made a case for an additional Ksh10 billion on top of the initial allocation proposed for the 2025/2026 financial year.

“This request was justified by the urgent need to scale up child protection service delivery in response to rising cases of abuse, neglect and exploitation,” CS Cheptumo told Senators. “We also need to recruit and deploy additional Children Officers, operationalise new sub-county offices and strengthen data management through the Child Protection Information Management System (CPIMS).”

According to the ministry’s submission to the National Treasury, the total budget estimate for the 2025/2026 financial year stands at Ksh12.318 billion, comprising KSh12.074 billion in recurrent expenditure and Ksh244 million in development spending. Cheptumo added that the ministry had worked to ensure the department’s priorities were well integrated into national planning instruments such as Kenya Vision 2030, the Fourth Medium-Term Plan (2023–2027) and the Bottom-Up Economic Transformation Agenda (BETA).

These alignments, she said are designed to make child protection a national priority, ensuring that funding proposals receive greater visibility and competitiveness during the national budget process.

On administrative restructuring, the Cabinet Secretary noted that separating the State Department for Children Services from the State Department for Social Protection and Senior Citizen Affairs had helped enhance budget visibility. “This structural change has allowed for more targeted planning and resource allocation for child protection functions,” she said.

Sen. Miraj also sought to know what mechanisms the ministry had put in place to ensure timely and full utilisation of funds allocated to children’s welfare and protection programmes, including the Victims Protection Fund. In response, CS Cheptumo said the ministry had implemented stringent financial controls aligned with the Public Finance Management Act of 2012 and the Public Procurement and Disposal Act of 2005.

“The Ministry has prioritised timely approval of work plans, procurement plans and cash flow schedules,” she said. “We are also ensuring prompt requisition of exchequers from the National Treasury and empowering accounting officers and departmental heads to approve payments within their limits to eliminate bureaucratic delays.”

She explained that the Victim Protection Trust Fund, established under the Victim Protection Act of 2014, remains a key vehicle for supporting victims of crime and abuse of power, particularly children.

A further question from Sen. Miraj sought a breakdown of the number of Children Officers deployed in each county and clarification on how the ministry intends to address the issue of officers being stretched across multiple counties. CS Cheptumo revealed that as of June 2025, there were 714 Children Officers serving across all 47 counties, 290 constituencies and 353 operational sub-county offices.

She admitted, however, that the number was far from adequate. “Kenya currently has about 18 million children, meaning each officer is responsible for roughly 25,000 children,” revealed the CS.

The Cabinet Secretary cited findings from a National Workforce Mapping Report, launched in April 2025 with support from UNICEF, which exposed severe staffing deficits, logistical constraints and unmanageable caseloads per officer. 

To address the staffing crisis, CS Cheptumo announced that her ministry had submitted a proposal to recruit 500 additional Children Officers in the 2025/2026 financial year. “Our goal is to eliminate cases where one officer is forced to cover multiple counties,” she assured the Senate.

The ministry also plans to introduce targeted and equitable deployment, enhance training and professional development, and scale up the Child Protection Information Management System (CPIMS) for better caseload management and real-time monitoring.

During the supplementary questions segment, Senators urged the Ministry to shift from planning to delivering tangible results.

In response, CS Cheptumo reaffirmed the Ministry’s commitment to safeguarding the welfare of children and pledged to appear before the Senate whenever required to address any arising concerns.