Effect Of Integrated Financial Management Information System On Performance Of Public Finance: A Case Of County Government Of Kisumu

ABSTRACT

The Government of Kenya in its endeavor to enhance service delivery and accountability in the public finance management has introduced Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS) for all its financial and accounting processes such as revenue collection, fiscal planning, supply chain management and expenditure control. Since its inception in 2003, it is evident that IFMIS implementation has had challenges in driving day-to-day operations of the government systems. A number of scholars attribute improved performance to IFMIS practices, while some existing literature reports contradict this, on basis of working conditions and resources sufficiency; which has potential of adversely affecting training and development of employees thereby affecting the competence level of IFMIS staff. Existing information majorly deal with either IFMIS and Revenue, IFMIS and Financial Reporting or IFMIS and Budgetary Control; but neglecting other variables that affect or are affected by IFMIS such as technical support services and IFMIS staff level of competence. Furthermore, portions of previous studies find no significant benefits attributed to use of IFMIS alongside challenges facing internal control systems, revenue declining trend as well as the unsteady trend in expenditure. This study was to establish effect of IFMIS on performance of public finance in Kenya with reference to County Government of Kisumu. The specific objectives were; to establish the effect of IFMIS practices on Competence level of IFMIS staff, to determine effect of IFMIS on Timeliness of Financial Services, and to analyze effect of IFMIS on Revenue Turnover. The anchoring theories for this study were Systems theory and Agency theory. Correlational research design was employed for the study. Target population for the study consisted of 120 management staff drawn from different departments while, stratified random sampling was used to select a sample size of 70 staff. Both primary and secondary data were used. Structured questionnaires were used to collect primary data while data schedules were used to collect secondary data. The study adopted correlation and regression analysis at 5% level of significance to determine strength and direction of the relationship of the variables under study. The analysis showed that adherence to training curriculum had the strongest positive (Pearson correlation coefficient =.657; p-value= .003< .05) effect on Performance of IFMIS on public finance. In addition, regularity of training programs and adherence with system control process were positively correlated to performance of IFMIS on public finance (Pearson correlation coefficient =.436 and .385 p- value= .004