National Treasury Cannot Provide Evidence of how Eurobond Billions were Spent

It has emerged that the National Treasury cannot provide evidence of how the Eurobond billions were spent.

This is according to the Cabinet Secretary Henry Rotich and this raises more eyebrows especially after he had promised to give a full list of all the projects that had been funded by the Eurobond cash.

According to Mr. Rotich, 196.9 billion shillings that were part of the proceeds from the sovereign bond were put together with other cash from the government revenue and then disbursed as one. This implies that when the when the cash was disbursed, there was no clear cut of whether the cash was from the Eurobond or the government revenue. This has made it difficult for the Treasury to pinpoint specific infrastructural projects funded by the Eurobond cash.

In the recent past, the National Treasury has been under attack from the opposition as well as from the general public over the spending of the Eurobond cash but Mr. Rotich now seems to be separating the Treasury from the whole issue after he claimed that the ministries are the one responsible for the spending of the cash and that they are accountable to the parliament.

A while ago, Mr. Rotich had issued a two week ultimatum to all the state department to give a list of the projects they had funded using the Eurobond cash.

The bitter truth however, is that the interest that the Eurobond has attracted and which the taxpayer ought to have paid is now nine billion shillings and by the end of this fiscal year in June 2016, the interest would have reached 16.4 billion shillings.

Eurobond is not like a loan or a grant which upon failure to pay due to some financial constraints. With the Eurobond, one must pay. This shows that whether the cash was used or not, the taxpayer must pay for it.

Article by Juma Fred.