Effect Of Citizen Participation On Service Delivery In Kenya: A Case Of Healthcare Sector In Garissa County

ABSTRACT

Public service delivery in the public Kenya has over the decades faced challenges. The introduction of various policies for instance performance contracting as well as measurement and evaluation has not yielded expected results. There was hence a need to focus approach on other strategies to improve service delivery in the public sector for instance the adoption of public participation. Public participation helps to promote transparency and in so doing, there is reduction of corruption and bureaucratic inefficiencies which leads to an improvement in service delivery. Even though public participation is deemed to lead to an improvement in service delivery in the public sector, few studies have linked it to service delivery in Kenya. Studies that have focused on public participation have given little focus on the health sector. A need exists for a study linking public participation and service delivery in the health sector. This study hence sought to interrogate citizen participation on service delivery of the Health sector in Garissa County. Specifically, the study sought to establish the effect of consultation on service delivery in the health care sector in Kenya, establish the effect of collaborative planning on service delivery in the health care sector in Kenya, determine the effect of public-private partnerships on service delivery in the health care sector in Kenya and to ascertain the effect of public education on service delivery in the health care sector in Kenya. The County was considered for the study as it has demonstrated poor service delivery in the health sector. A survey done in 2016 revealed that there was less funding for operations and maintenance in hospitals which lead to meager quality of care, de-motivated staff and reduced service use and obtain-ability. For this reason, the county is considered for this study. The study was anchored on the rights based Perspective theory of Public participation, Participatory democratic theory and the cognitive engagement theory. The study adopted a descriptive survey design. The target population comprised of the staff from the health department as well as the citizens who participate in public decision making process. A total of 1508 respondents were targeted. A sample size of 306 was obtained from this population. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data which was analyzed using inferential and descriptive methods and presented in figures and tables. A multivariate regression analysis was adopted for this study. Correlation results indicated that consultation, collaborative planning, public-private partnerships and public education have a positive and significant association with the service delivery in the healthcare sector in Garissa County. The study concluded that citizen participation in form of consultation, collaborative planning, public-private partnerships and public education with the County of Garissa is moderate. The study recommends Garissa County citizens to consult more with the County through attitude surveys and participating in open forum meetings and participate public hearings so as improve the service delivery in the health care sector in Garissa County. There is need for the citizens of Garissa County to have more deliberations with the county by participating in advisory boards, project implementation and in project feasibility analysis since this can improve the service delivery in the health care sector in Garissa County. Finally, the study recommends the citizens of Garissa County to improve their information exchange with the County by accessing County website materials and participating more in mutual benchmarking and workshops so as to boost their service delivery in the health care sector in Garissa County.