Nominated MP, John Mbadi called out President William Ruto, stating that his promise to reduce spending by the government from the budget was a lie.
According to Mbadi, when the UDA government was campaigning, one of their promises was that his government would be better than Ihiru’s tenure. This promise was coupled with a reduction of the 2023-24 budget by Ksh 300bn from the 2022-23 budget.
This has however not happened because the budget has now increased by about Ksh 410 billion.
“When William Ruto came into power and was sworn in, he said he’d reduce the budget created by Uhuru by 300bn. He not only managed to decrease it by that instead, increased it by 410bn,” He said in an interview.
He mentions that the government’s 2023-24 budget has misplaced projections on the collection of revenue Avenues.
“Your projections on revenue collection are out of place. There is no way you will collect 698 billion more from Kenya, ” He added.
He further mentions that the planned income tax of over Ksh 300 billion is impossible. According to him, the government’s plan to raise revenue by imposing harsh taxes on its citizens would backfire on them.
The middle-class citizens will be made poorer, there’ll be an increase in the number of people living below the poverty line and the revenue to be collected will be impossible. He goes on to say that the government needs to find alternate solutions to raise revenue.
John Mbadi comments on the finance bill
The National Treasury drafted and presented a 4.5 trillion budget before Parliament. This budget that has been drafted is more than that presented from 2022-23. Last year’s budget was at 3.324 trillion, lower than the proposed budget.
In the budget, 718.9 billion has been allocated to development, Ksh 850 billion to consolidation fund services, and Ksh 775.1 billion as interest on the country’s debt. The national government has been allocated Ksh 2.3 trillion, counties allocated Ksh 385.4 billion, and Parliament has been allocated Ksh 41 billion.
Moreover, the judiciary has been allocated Ksh 23 billion to cover the court expenses and finally, the state House has been allocated Ksh 7.3 billion.
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In addition to that, the National Treasury Budget and Appropriations Committee proposed an extra Ksh 1.2 billion to the recurrent budget. This money will be used to hire more tax assistants to help the president’s agenda. This agenda is to tighten the noose on ‘hustlers’ who have not been paying taxes.
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The Government taxman plans to collect Ksh 257 trillion from citizens to fund the budget. The government plans to finance the deficit by borrowing funds.
