No respite for Kenyans
The first two years of President William Ruto’s administration have been quite challenging. The general verdict is that the Kenya Kwanza coalition government has performed below expectations. And it is largely to blame for heightening the people’s expectations with lofty election campaign promises that it has failed to fulfil.
This explains why the leadership is often accused of lying to Kenyans. The mantra during the 2022 General Election campaigns was that the lives of the so-called hustlers would be improved once President Ruto took charge. Instead, the government has piled on taxes and increased statutory deductions.
For the salaried employees, it has been a relentless raid on shrinking payslips for healthcare, the housing levy, and higher pension contributions, as the cost of living skyrockets.
But Ruto administration believes it is still on the right track. Indeed, the President himself has declared that in the end, he will prove his critics wrong. But from the look of things, this will be a tall order. The government has continued to suffer setbacks, having to drop some of the initiatives it was banking on to win public confidence.
The President himself announced the cancellation of the shady multibillion Indian conglomerate Adani Group contracts to lease the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport for 30 years and build power transmission lines.
The chaotic rollout of the Social Health Insurance Fund (SHIF) under the Social Health Authority (SHA) has not made matters any better. It has been terrible for critically ill patients requiring dialysis or chemotherapy to stay alive.
The government claims to have stabilised the economy, citing a strengthening Kenya shilling, and supposedly increasing investor confidence. It believes Kenyans will happier though some painful decisions have had to be made.
As the government trumpets its supposed successes, it should know they are not being felt by the people. In the New Year, it must work harder to improve the economic situation.
