INTERGRATED FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEMS AND FINANCIAL ACCOUNTABILITY OF COUNTY GOVERNMENTS IN WESTERN KENYA

Abstract

The implementation of Integrated Financial Management Information System is aimed at increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of both county and national governments financial management. It also facilitates adoption of modern public expenditure practices in line with the international financial management standards. Despite IFMIS being implemented, many county governments’ still face accountability challenges. The Purpose of this study was to establish the effect of integrated financial management information system and financial accountability in county governments in western Kenya. The specific objectives were; to determine the effect of budgetary control on financial accountability of county Governments in western Kenya, to evaluate the effect of financial reporting on financial accountability of county Governments in western Kenya, to establish the effect of internal control on financial accountability of county Governments in western Kenya. The study was guided by Agency theory, Accountability theory and Technological Acceptance model. The study adopted correlational research design. Primary data was collected using questionnaires. The study target population was1110 county staffs comprising of County secretaries, ICT directors, finance staff, revenue officers, economic and planning and procurement staff. Purposive sampling was used to select 294 respondents. Reliability was teste dusting Cronbach Alpha while the validity was done using principal component analysis. IBM Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20.0 was used to analyze descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics consisted of measures of frequency and dispersion. Inferential statistics consisted of Binary logistic regression analysis. Cox-Snell’s R Squared was established as 0.699. Wald statistic was significant with p values of 0.19, 0.00, and 0.022 for budgetary controls, financial reporting and internal controls respectively. Correlation analysis results for budgetary controls, financial reporting and internal controls was r = of 0.814, 0.944, and 0.686 respectively. The binary logistic regression coefficients were β = 2.049, p-value .019 and Exp (β) = 7.76 for budgetary controls, β of 6.17, p-value .000 and Exp (β) =479.88 for financial reporting and β of 2.17, p-value .022 and Exp (β) = 8.794 for internal controls respectively. The result of this study suggests that use of IFMIS in both national and devolved government may improve on financial accountability because the variables had a positive significant effect on dependent and independent variables