Mbeere North Member of Parliament Geoffrey Ruku has claimed that Kenya is the least taxed country compared to other nations, suggesting a further increase in tax to support various government projects.
During Citizen TV’s DayBreak show on Monday, Ruku opined that increase in taxes will consequently raise the revenue collection that would supplement fundamental projects like education, health and infrastructure.
“One of the directions we should take is to gradually raise our tax revenue in a gradual manner. What Kenya Kwanza government is proposing at the moment is that we be able to raise from 14%-16% by so doing we will be able to go to Ksh.2.8 trillion that would be enough to finance developmental activities like education,” he said.
The MP went ahead to compare the taxation rate of Kenya and other countries thereby concluding Kenya is the least taxed country unlike South Africa, Botswana, Norway, Turkey and Germany which according to him are taxed more.
“You can Google the tax revenue to GDP of our country which is about 14% and compare it with South Africa, Botswana with Germany with Norway with Turkey we are quite at the bottom,” he narrated.
Ruku further added that most Kenyans cannot be able to afford a decent house in the country and that the government is coming up with a consolidated plan that would resolve the issues of slums in the country.
“Ninety-seven per cent of all salaried Kenyans cannot be able to own a decent house in our country, does it mean we are going to condemn all the salaried Kenyans for years? We have a responsibility as a responsible government to come up with a plan which we can sell to the entire nation to explain how Kenyan is not going to be a slum in another 15 years,” he stated.
He argued that housing is a major problem in the country and warned that in around 15 years Kenya would have more than 3000 slums if caution is not taken to resolve the issue of housing.
“And the projection rate, in another 15 years we would have more than 3000 slums everywhere if we don’t change the trajectory which we are taking.”
The MP highlighted preferential tax regime where salaried people pay taxes according to how much they earn.
