Big win for Sports Ministry as government resolves to have Sports Fund fully utilised for sports & arts

Cabinet Secretary for Youth Affairs, Creative Economy, and Sports, Salim Mvurya. IMAGE/ Courtesy

Big win for Sports Ministry as government resolves to have Sports Fund fully utilised for sports & arts

Joel Omotto 15:03 - 22.01.2025

The Ministry of Sports has finally won its long-standing battle to have the Sports Fund fully under its control after Cabinet resolved to revert it under its custody.

The Ministry of Sports has won a major battle after the Cabinet resolved to revert the Sports Arts and Social Development Fund (SASDF) to its parent ministry.

It means the fund will exclusively now be for the Ministry of Youth Affairs, Creative Economy and Sports, having originally seen 60 per cent of it go towards social development programmes like universal healthcare, while 35 was reserved for the Sports Ministry.

Successive Sports Cabinet Secretaries have been pushing for the fund to be fully utilised by the ministry to help develop and promote sports and arts in the country and the fight has now been won, following the Cabinet’s directive.

“The four (4) public funds categorised as state corporations need to be declassified and reverted back to the Ministry with a strengthened/more focused governance structure that will apply to all public funds,” read a statement following the Cabinet meeting held in Kakamega on Tuesday.

Better known as Sports Fund, the kitty was established under the Public Finance Management regulations in 2018 with the aim of aiding the development and promotion of sports and arts as well as universal healthcare.

It draws its proceeds from betting and lotteries, according to section 69(A) of the Betting, Lotteries and Gaming Act, but there has been an outcry over the fact that sports and arts got the short end of the stick, leading to calls for its full return to the ministry.

However, last November, the Treasury proposed an amendment to ringfence the fund only for the Sports Ministry which the National Assembly adopted, accelerating the latest move which sees the Ministry of Health cease to benefit from the kitty.

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