Busia Senator Okiya Omtatah is back in court this time seeking to suspend the ongoing public participation in the Finance Bill 2024 saying it has been tabled prematurely.
In documents filed before the Milimani Law Courts, Omtatah and Eliud Karanja Matindi state that it is only after Parliament has procedurally enacted the Appropriation Act, 2024, that the Finance Bill, 2024, can lawfully be introduced in the National Assembly.
The Finance Act and the Appropriation Act are interdependent. The Finance Act provides for the generation of resources while the Appropriation Act provides for expenditure.
"Not setting up the appropriation act before presenting the Bill is against article 220 of the constitution," read their documents in part.
Article 220 states that “Budgets of the national and county governments shall contain— estimates of revenue and expenditure, differentiating between recurrent and development expenditure”.
But the duo argue that the Finance Bill, 2024, has been tabled prematurely because there is no approved fiscal framework for the Financial Year 2024/2025, which it is supposed to implement.
"The approved fiscal framework will only come to life with the enactment, with public participation, of the Appropriation Act, 2024," says Omtatah.
The Senator wants the court to issue an order suspending the consideration by the National Assembly, the Finance Bill 2024, which was published in Nairobi on May 9 2024, in a Special Issue of the Kenya Gazette.
He also seeks to have the matter referred to Chief Justice Martha Koome to form a bench that will determine the matter which he says raises substantial questions of law.
Finance Bill 2024, which was published on May 9, 2024, in a Special Issue of the Kenya Gazette is already undergoing public participation as per the National Assembly’s public participation advert dated May 15, 2024.
But the petitioners reiterate that it is only after the F/Y 2024/2025 budget estimates of revenue and expenditure have been considered and enacted in law, with public participation, through the Appropriations Act, 2024, that the Finance Bill, 2024, can then be published and processed into law, to become the Finance Act, 2024.
The Bill proposes a wide array of tax and administrative measures affecting different tax laws.
