State House to Spend at Least Ksh 500 Million per Month in New Budget

Kenya is a country of controversy and irony. As nurses go on strike over pay, as some Kenyans die for lack of food, State House might be smiling all the way to the bank following an increase in its budget.

The National Treasury, in the new Budget Proposal, has increase budget for State House to 11.2 billion shillings for the 2019/2020 financial year, a 26 percent increase.

With the new budget allocation, the State House will be spending a cool 500 million shillings per month without breaking any back apart from the already emaciated taxpayers.

State House, in the past, has been blamed for overspending taxpayers money on events and foreign travels with huge expenditures tied on President Kenyatta’s numerous foreign travels with a contingent of “state officers.”

In the current budget proposal, 6 billion shillings have been allocated for “buying goods for President Uhuru Kenyatta’s office,” an increase from 4.6 billion shillings in the last financial year. Breaking this down, to effectively “utilize the money”, the office will have to use 16.4 million shillings every day. Amazing. Right?

Those working at State House should start celebrating because their compensation budget just rose to 2.5 billion shillings from 2.3 billion shillings.

President Uhuru Kenyatta and his Deputy, Dr. William Ruto also have a reason to personally smile because their salaries are set to increase by 3.6 percent.

Currently, President Uhuru Kenyatta is earning a combined annual basic salary of 38 million shillings while his deputy pockets 36.6 million shillings.

The increase in salaries of the President and his Deputy is ironic and hypocrisy on the part of the two leaders who had vowed to reduce their own salaries.