Dear All, We welcome President Kenyatta's explanation of why he rejected the Finance Bill. We, however, do not agree with him. He has missed the point. His prescriptions are informed by a wrong diagnosis of the problem. The issues are that the manner we craft our national budgets is wrong. The consumer versus production budget aspects are fluid and do not come out at all. We rely on non-existent revenue to approve huge and unnecessary expenditures. Second, a third of our budget goes to financing corruption and dubious pending bills. Third, incessant over-borrowing appetite has got the country into repaying in excess of Sh70 billion monthly. That borrowing has been extended to more than 5 key local banks which are involved in corruption as evidenced on the NYS scam. Fourth, the Foreign Direct Investments are dwindling. Fifth, the tax base keeps declining. Sixth, the fiscal policy remains in sharp clash with the monetary policy. The two do not speak to each other over their incompatibility. We had hoped President Kenyatta would sign the Finance Bill 2018 as is and then call for review of the budget. The areas to cut budgets include non-revenue capital expenditures; a freeze on building the Standard Gauge Railway extension and a more serious and non-selective corruption fight. We are for instance disturbed that President Kenyatta's own relatives around him in State House have not been prosecuted long after they confessed to serious corruption. Countless parastatal bosses accused of corruption remain untouched. Some buildings standing on riparian land and road reserves are untouched. Until President Kenyatta stops double-speak on the fight against corruption, Kenyans should never trust him on corruption onslaught.

From the foregoing, we urge all Kenyans from all walks of life to urge their MPs to show up in Parliament and defeat proposals by the President. Removal of tax on fuel, like retaining interest rate caps, should not be negotiable. The idea of reducing tax to 8% makes little impact.

Finally, we maintain that for the turnaround of our economy, the President must move with speed to make management changes at the National Treasury. ****************** You can also find the statement on our website: http://www.cofek.co.ke/index.php/news-and-media/1974-why-we-do-not-accept-wi th-uhuru-for-rejecting-finance-bill You can follow us on Twitter: @cofekrebranded Gab: www.gab.ai/consumerskenya Facebook: www.facebook.com/consumerskenya Subscribe to our SMS alerts: Send 'Cofek On' to 40408 from your phone. Each SMS costs Sh5 You can join our membership: http://www.cofek.co.ke/index.php/news-and-media/1139-become-a-cofek-member-t oday-enjoy-low-subscription-rates _______________________________________________ CofekDigest mailing list CofekDigest@lists.cofek.co.ke http://mail.cofek.co.ke/mailman/listinfo/cofekdigest_cofek.co.ke