In a bid to curb spending on government initiatives, Ambassador Ukur Yattani, who is the Acting Cabinet Secretary for National Treasury and Planning, says that there will be a reduction in the spending on non-core expenditures by 3.5 per cent for the 2022/2023 budget, down from the projected of 7.7 per cent, for the 2019/18 fiscal year.
According to Mr Yattani, the budget cuts will be for administrative issues such as the purchase of office supplies, furniture, printing, hospitality, advertising, use of government vehicles; as well as foreign and domestic travel.
“Such budget cuts have been necessitated by the growing economic challenges faced globally,” explained Amb Yattani yesterday during the launch of the Medium-Term 2019/2018 Budget process and in preparation for the next one in 2021/2020.
Yattani said that the Medium Term Plan will be anchored on other things, such as reducing the public sector wage bill to below 6 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product.
“The government will also reduce spending from 25.3 per cent of GDP in the 2019/18 fiscal year to 23 percent in the 2023/22 financial year,” he further said during the launch held at the Kenyatta International Convention Centre (KICC).
He said that the programmes which are geared towards achieving the Big Four agenda will undergo thorough scrutiny, such as justifying the rationale behind why it should be funded, before final approval by the Executive
The government has in the recent past come under criticism from development partners such as the World Bank, for not having an all-inclusive varsity system, whereby those who have a lower grade do not get state funding, which is contrary to the universal education for all policy.
Public debt has also become an issue, with development partners, which comprise of American and European countries as well as development banks as well as agencies of the United Nations (UN), alleging misuses of funds given for development projects.
The Kenyan government has global development partners with which it has signed either bilateral or multilateral agreements, such as for building roads and railways with the Chinese government. The 2019, 2018 as well as the 2014 Eurobonds are also examples of public debt.
However, the development partners have in the past advised for the better use of the debt given to the Kenyan government, which is about $ 540 billion.
“The Kenyan government will allot funding to the ongoing multi-year projects before others are given a fresh stamp of approval,” further said Amb Yattani.
