Stalemate: Why Ruto, Raila talks on the brink of collapse

What was the last stage of report writing for the National Dialogue Committee was cut short as the two sides sharply disagreed on the issue of cost of living.

Azimio led by former Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka declared a stalemate after their Kenya Kwanza counterparts refused to budge on lowering the cost of living.

The parties failing to hit a compromise called off the report writing exercise but agreed to reconvene next Wednesday.

By last evening, there were speculations that the talks could all together collapse if the government side holds onto their hard stance next week.

“Since the mandate of the committee expires on Friday next week, if there is no agreement on Wednesday, the talks may be considered to have collapsed irredeemably,” the source told the Star.

The source continued, “The parties took a break from the talks after they failed to agree on the single issue of reducing cost of living, prompting Azimio to declare a stalemate.”

According to multiple sources in the morning session at Stoni Athi in Machakos county, Azimio had insisted that VAT and other taxes on fuel be cut to at least eight per cent.

The proposal was however resisted by Kenya Kwanza led by National Assembly Majority Leader Kimani Ichung’wah.

The Ruto camp argued that their hands are tied given the 16 per cent VAT on fuel was part of the deal with IMF thus not open to discussion.

Kenya Kwanza also dismissed Azimio’s proposal to heighten the social protection programmes to have more deserving people on board.

The government side shot down the idea arguing there were no funds for that.

Another point of departure was on the housing levy, which Raila team wanted scrapped, reduced or made voluntary to reduce the burden on Kenyans.

“At this point, Kenya Kwanza insisted that is their flagship manifesto promise that cannot be dropped or tampered with,” the source told the Star.

“The only thing Kenya Kwanza conceded was reduction of Road Maintenance Levy from Sh18 to Sh13.”

“They also agreed to reduction of anti-adulteration levy from Sh18 to Sh15.”

Appearing before the talks committee on November 6, National Treasury Cabinet Secretary Njuguna Ndung'u warned the committee against tampering with any of the tax measures in the current Finance Act 2023.

“Considering that all the above measures that have been factored in the revenue projections that informed the FY 2023-24 budget, the removal will result in revenue shortfall hence negatively affect the implementation of the budget,” he stated.

The developments came on a day Raila reiterated his team will not sign the report if the issue of cost of living is not addressed.

“The team in the talks must come up with the solutions to the cost of living, we want the cost of living to come down,” Raila said during a meeting with members of clergy at Westlands Primary School.

The former Prime Minister also listed audit of the IEBC servers and IEBC reconstitution as their irreducible minimum.

Opposition chief at the same time faulted the President for ‘lying’ to Kenyans during campaigns.

He claimed the President has reneged on his promises to Kenyans that were meant to make life bearable for the ‘hustlers’.

Speaking on Wednesday, Raila said hustlers and Mama Mboga on whose plight Ruto campaigned in 2022 have been neglected as more punitive taxes are being introduced.

“During campaigns they were calling themselves godsend and Raila was being branded a devil, suddenly the language of hustlers, Mama Mboga and bottom up has disappeared, nobody talks about them,” Raila said.

The Azimio leader was accompanied by Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna, Woman Representative Esther Passaris, MP Tim Wanyonyi and ODM Deputy Party leader Wycliffe Oparanya.