Lavish spending by Jubilee government unabated – CoB

Lavish spending of taxpayers’ money has persisted unabated in President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Jubilee administration, despite numerous promises of austerity in hard times.

A new report by Controller of Budget Margaret Nyakango has exposed how government agencies spent more than Sh27 billion on non-core functions, including travel, hospitality and conferences.

Long before the Covid-19 pandemic, Kenya’s economy was mired in debt and joblessness, struggling to raise revenue.

The 2019-20 budget implementation review report for the first nine months of the fiscal year lists the presidency, Parliament and the Interior ministry among the big spenders.

According to the report, ministries, departments and agencies’ (MDAs) spending on domestic and foreign travel hit Sh12.8 billion, an increase of 7.6 per cent from last year’s Sh11.9 billion.

Domestic travel shot up to Sh8.5 billion from Sh7.7 billion in the same period last year.

Foreign travel also increased, though marginally, from Sh4.2 billion to Sh4.3 billion.

The report shows that despite Treasury’s promises to cut down spending on non-essentials the MDAs still splashed Sh4.5 billion on hospitality, which include snacks, staff tea and entertaining state guests.

In a similar period last year, the government spent Sh3.8 billion.

The government also spent another Sh700 million on litigation.

The presidency, which is comprised of Uhuru’s office, Deputy President William Ruto’s office and the Cabinet, utilised Sh607.5 million on domestic and Sh184 million on foreign travel.

This is a significant reduction compared to Sh704.4 million and Sh196.6 the previous year.

The Interior ministry headed by CS Fred Matiang’i spent Sh1.8 billion on domestic and foreign travel.

Sh900.2 million was spent on hospitality and Sh152.2 million spent on training.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs led by CS Raychellle Omamo spent Sh1.7 billion on foreign and domestic travel.

In what could put Parliament on the spot, the National Assembly and the Senate have once again emerged as the single largest spenders on domestic and foreign travel.

The legislature spent Sh6.6 billion, a similar amount to spending in the same period last year. The National Assembly alone, with 349 members, spent Sh4.2 billion.

Parliament has often been in the spotlight for ignoring the Treasury’s austerity warnings and engaging in expensive trips.

Members have been accused of awarding themselves hefty perks, including house allowances, contrary to guidelines by the Salaries and Remuneration Commission.

The legislators’ appetite for travel has been attributed to hefty allowances every time they move out of Nairobi on official duty.

The MPs are some of the best remunerated public officers. They take home Sh710,000 in salary every month besides Sh5,000 sitting allowance per session. They also get a car maintenance allowance.

The Parliamentary Service Commission, which has only 10 members excluding the staff, spent Sh1.9 billion on both local and foreign travels.

The commission’s expenditure on domestic travel stagnated at Sh1.2 billion while that of foreign increased to Sh803.1 million from Sh695.3 million last year.

PSC’s expenditure is a sharp contrast to that of the Judicial Service Commission. The JSC led by Chief Justice David Maraga spent Sh60.6 million on both local and foreign travel with Sh70.7 million going towards hospitality.

The huge spending continued despite notices by Treasury CS Ukur Yatani to state agencies to reduce spending on non-essentials.

Last year, the CS warned MDAs of “painful, brutal” budget cuts. This followed the huge revenue shortfall and runaway spending on non-essentials.

“The cuts will be brutal, sustained and without option. It is high time for us to adjust accordingly because the success of government will depend entirely on our dignity as a country to be self-sufficient in our own development priorities,” he told the ministries last year.

In September, Yatani made good on his threat and froze all bench-marking trips to contain the ballooning government costs.

“All bench-marking and study tours are immediately suspended until further notice,” Yatani said in a notice.

The CS further told his Cabinet colleagues that in the event they travel, their delegations should not exceed four persons while those by Principal Secretaries should not exceed three.

However, despite the warnings, the expenditures on non-essentials have continued to rise while the recurrent costs still consume more than three-quarters of the total government costs.

Out of the revised annual budget of Sh2.7 trillion, the government had spent Sh1.8 trillion or 67 per cent of the annual target over the period between July 2019 and March 2020.

This represents an increase of 6.2 per cent in expenditure.

Of the total expenditure, Sh1.3 trillion up from Sh1.1 trillion went towards recurrent expenses.

A mere Sh242.2 billion went to development with Sh207.3 billion disbursed to counties as shareable revenue from the national government.

“An analysis of the recurrent expenditure by economic category shows that Personnel Emoluments recorded the highest category at Sh315.8 billion and represented 40.7 per cent of the gross recurrent expenditure by MDAs,” the report reads.

According to the report, the Teachers Service Commission was the biggest spender on recurrent expenditure with Sh192.3 billion. This is attributed to more than Sh350,000 teachers on its payroll.

Interior, which includes the police service, spent Sh85.4 billion on staff emoluments followed by the state department of early learning and basic education, which takes care of the free primary and secondary education, with Sh78.6 billion.

Other ministries big on recurrent expenditure are the Ministry of Defence (Sh71.2 billion), National Treasury (Sh28.1 billion), Ministry of Health (Sh26.5 billion) and State Department of University Education (Sh43 billion).

CoB Nyakango stated the need to watch government spending as Covid-19 takes a heavy toll on revenue performance.

“There is need for continuous monitoring of the economy by respective institutions on the impact of this crisis, and development of a framework for action aimed at saving lives, protecting households, businesses, and the economy from the fallout of the pandemic,” she said.

The CS James Macharia-led Transport and Infrastructure Ministry spent the highest amount of development voted. State departments of transport and infrastructure spent Sh90.3 billion and Sh85.2 billion, respectively.