Why debate on Finance Bill is only half the story

The National Treasury is clearly aware of the political sensitivity involved and has moved proactively to conduct public participation countrywide, a commendable step, especially given the turbulence of 2024.

The memory of the June 2024 Finance Bill protests is still fresh. What began as civic discontent escalated into nationwide demonstrations, tragic loss of life, and eventually the unprecedented withdrawal of the Bill by President William Ruto.

Kenya’s public debt

That episode was a watershed moment. It is a reminder that Kenyans are not passive spectators in fiscal governance. The government appears to have internalised that lesson, and the current outreach effort reflects a more consultative posture. However, there is a glaring omission in the ongoing conversation: Expenditure accountability.

Revenue mobilisation cannot be discussed in isolation from how previously collected revenue and borrowed funds have been utilised. Kenya’s public debt now stands at approximately Sh10.6 trillion, representing roughly 65–68 per cent of GDP. Much of this debt was accumulated over the last decade, a period that also saw significant infrastructure investment — the Standard Gauge Railway, expanded energy capacity, and more. These are real outputs, but they do not fully account for the scale of borrowing, and that gap demands honest answers.

The annual audit process, as conducted by the Auditor General, remains largely a fiscal compliance exercise. What is missing is a rigorous value-for-money dimension, one that asks not just whether funds were spent within the rules, but whether they delivered meaningful returns to citizens.

Tax revenue is not the government’s money. It is the people’s seed capital, entrusted to the state to catalyse growth and improve livelihoods. When that implicit contract is broken, no Finance Bill, however carefully crafted, will enjoy genuine public confidence.

Economic consequences

So what would an audit beyond fiscal compliance look like? It would begin with outcome mapping. Tracking not just whether a road was built, but whether it reduced travel time and opened economic corridors. It would include social return assessments on health and education spending, measuring service delivery improvements against funds committed. It would demand project completion audits, independently verifying that the infrastructure delivered matches what was contracted and paid for.

Most critically, it would involve a debt utility audit, a systematic review of every major loan facility, what it was designated for, what it actually funded, and what measurable impact it generated.

The domestic borrowing strategy also carries serious economic consequences. When the government crowds out the private sector from the credit market, it undermines the very engine it claims to be trying to ignite. Businesses that cannot access affordable credit cannot expand, cannot hire, and cannot generate the tax revenues that reduce the government’s dependence on borrowing in future cycles. This is a self-defeating loop that fiscal policy must urgently address.

Public participation on the Finance Bill is a necessary and welcome development. But it must be accompanied by equal transparency on the expenditure side. Kenyans are not merely being asked to pay more. They are being asked to trust again. That trust must be earned with accountability, not assumed.

Mr Ali is a development communication professional. [email protected]