Kenya is Broke, Please Tighten Your Belts

The National Treasury, through the Cabinet Secretary Henry Rotich, has shocked Kenyans by admitting that Kenya is broke.

The CS has revealed that the country is experiencing a shortfall of revenue that runs into 70 billion shillings and that it may be hard for the government to fund development projects.

The first to be hit with this revelation is the county governments after the CS said that the Treasury was planning to slush the amount allocated to county governments by at least 17 billion shillings.

“We are running short of revenues. There was a slowdown in business activities because of elections but we are now catching up,” said the CS who was before the Senate to explain why there have been delays in disbursing funds to the counties.

The CS also heaped blame on the Kenya Revenue Authority for failing to collect enough revenue especially in 2017.

The revelation comes barely two weeks after the country issued two Eurobonds that raised 203 billion shillings that were aimed at being used for developmental projects.

The country’s foreign debt now stands at 4.8 trillion shillings, more than 56 percent of Kenya’s GDP and six points above the International Monetary Fund’s recommended standard of 50 percent.

The Treasury had in the past insisted that the country was still ‘within the borrowing range’ despite a possible warning from the International Monetary Fund.

Possible reasons why we are broke

A while ago, some people, whom we know very well, admitted that they used to carry millions of money in shopping bags from the National Youth Service (NYS). It is said that more than 20 billion shillings were looted. Some of the alleged looters have now joined the political world and are now ‘leaders.’ How can we not be broke?

Corruption is deeply rooted in almost every sector and ministry. People are looting public funds with impunity and even hiding their loot out of Kenya. There are no strong rules and regulations put in place to fight corruption. In fact, all the money we are borrowing from other countries, we are borrowing it for others to loot and for Kenyans to pay through the nose.

Big companies in this country don’t pay taxes and if they do, they do not represent the correct records of their income. Those who pay taxes are ‘small’ Kenyans, the poor on the ground and employees who pay through PAYE and VAT.