The Azimio La Umoja One Kenya Coalition has vehemently opposed the move by the government to retrench public servants as a mechanism to reduce the huge wage bill.

The Raila Odinga-led coalition has expressed that public servants cannot be laid off yet the government was busy hiring Chief Administrative Secretaries (CAS).

Currently, the government requires Sh50 billion budget to cater for the salaries of public servants without including the perks of the newly recruited CASs.

“We repeat.No civil servants is going to be retrenched while Ruto is busy hiring CASs and other personell the country doesn’t need.Not under our watch,” Wandayi stated.

Taxpayers are poised to bear the burden of Sh460 million annually in salaries for the 50 Chief Administrative Secretaries.

CAS are entitled to the same gross pay as Permanent secretaries whose pay was reviewed by the Salaries and Remuneration Commission to ShSh765,188 from Sh874.500.

This comes even as the Chair of the Council of Economic advisors David Ndii stated that the government is mulling retrenching public servants due to the balloning wage bill.

Azimio has however blamed the financial situation to huge non priority spending by the Ruto led administration.

“Ruto must cut or completely abolish money being spent on political operations that are disguised as relief food distribution or fundraisers,”Wandayi asserted.

Azimio castigated the government for apportioning blame on the previous regimes over the current economic crisis urging them to offer solutions or exit from office.

Wandayi questioned why the economic situation has continued to deteriorate despite the removal of subsidies and increase in taxes.

“Where is the money saved from subsidies and those raised from taxes going?How can we save and raise taxes,only to get poorer?”Wandayi posed.

The Minority Leader raised an alarm that the situation could worsen in the coming days as the Kenya Revenue Authority has failed in meeting their revenue collection targets which is relied upon to finance several sectors.

In the financial year ending in June this year the taxman had a revenue target of Sh 2.1 trillion but according to the opposition they have managed to collect Sh 1.2 trillion facing a deficit of Sh 900 Billion.

“If you say you have met your revenue targets, then where is the money? Why haven’t you paid salaries to the workers?”Wandayi questioned.

He dismissed the declaration by the revenue collector body that they have met their targets and they anticipate a surplus in revenue collection by June,this year.

“And if it’s true that KRA has collected the money and remitted, then treasury must tell us where the money is? Why is it that just a few months after the regime of Kenya Kwanza, things are going south,”Wandayi said.

Ndii had blamed the current cash crunch on matured Chinese loans explaining that the government prioritized debt repayment first. 

The Opposition Coalition has however rubbished the explanation saying it’s a mere excuse calling on the government to offer Kenyans solutions instead of offering conflicting statements.

“Ndii has blamed the problem on matured Chinese loans.How Chinese loans stopped KRA from meeting its revenue targets,only Ndii knows,”Wandayi stated.

On his Twitter account, Ndii alluded that multiple loans are maturing in their billions, yet revenue is not growing in tandem.

He attributed the tax target misses to businesses not reporting profit growth, thus shrinking tax growth.

“Debt service is consuming 60 per cent plus of revenue. Liquidity crunches come with territory,” he tweeted.

This comes even as the government admitted to be broke as the state had yet to pay public servants their March salaries.

The devolved units are yet to receive their equitable share for the months of January, February and March due to the cash crunch.

As of March 2023,the National Treasury had released a partly Sh 141B out of Sh 370B for the financial year 2022-2023. By Irene Mwangi, Capital News