Nominated Member of Parliament John Mbadi has stated that President William Ruto is now breaking promises to Kenyans about cutting spending from what was used during Uhuru Kenyatta’s tenure.
According to Mbadi, President Ruto’s promise to cut Kenyatta’s budget by about Ksh.300 billion has fallen through, and the budget has instead been increased by about Ksh.410 billion.
“When President Ruto came to power, the day he was sworn in one of the things he said was that he was going to reduce Uhuru’s budgets by Ksh.300 billion. He not only managed to reduce it and instead increased from what Uhuru’s budget was by a further Ksh.410 billion,” he said.
MP Mbadi was speaking on Citizen TV’s Daybreak Show on Thursday.
He further censured the government over its 2023–24 budget estimate, which has recorded a Ksh.1 Trillion jump from the 2022/23 budget, noting that the government has misplaced its projections on revenue collection avenues.
According to Mbadi, the government’s plan to raise revenue through harsh taxation will fail and that alternative solutions should be sought.
“The government has increased expenditure and thinks that the best way to finance that increase is to overtax Kenyans,” he said.
“And I dare tell you that your projections on revenue are completely out of place. There is no way you are going to collect about Ksh.698 billion more in this country,” he added.
“Income tax alone you are projecting to collect over Ksh.300 billion more, it is not going to be possible and no matter how much you try to squeeze Kenyans, to raid our pockets, you are not going to succeed.”
The National Treasury tabled a Ksh.4.5 trillion budget before parliament on Wednesday, a stark increase from the last financial year which was Ksh.3.324 trillion.
The exchequer has allocated Ksh.718.9 billion for development, Ksh.850 billion for consolidated fund services, and Ksh.775.1 billion for interest on the country’s debt.
The national government will receive Ksh 2.3 trillion from the budget, followed by Ksh 385.4 billion for county governments and Ksh 41 billion for the parliament.
The Judiciary will be allocated Ksh.23 billion to run the courts with State House getting Ksh.7.3 billion.
The National Treasury expects the taxman to collect Ksh. 2,57 trillion in order to fund the budget, with the treasury attempting to finance the deficit through borrowing.
