Following the political and economic crisis triggered by the disputed announcement of the election of President Kibaki for a second term on December 30th 2007, it was hoped that Parliament would have used the opportunity presented by the National consensus on Agenda 4 to appropriate tax money for the benefit of the poorest of the poor and curb wasteful expenditure by the Government.   The 10th Parliament’s first two sessions have been a disappointment and unless public pressure is brought to bear the third session threatens to be a repeat.  Rather than using the parliamentary recess to promote national cohesion and consultations on necessary reform such as national budget realignment, MPs have spent the period heightening tensions amongst the population, and raising possibility of political and ethnic conflict. 

The recent divisions within the Grand Coalition and the public statements made by the leadership of both the ODM and PNU over what Justice Kriegler reported to be such a flawed election that there is no point in debating who won the Presidency; taken together with resignations of Narc Kenya ministers allegedly because of frustrated reform suggests that little or no attention is going to be focused on consultations over reform before Parliament reopens on April 21st 2009.  Certainly all these will affect the ability of MPs to focus on the need to tackle the budget deficit faced by Government by taking cost-reduction and cutting measures. 

Treasury’s pathetic stewardship of our public resources has cost Kenya billions of shillings every year, while Parliament’s lack of oversight has ensured that Kenyans are taxed to pay for waste, and corruption. There is policy paralysis in the Treasury as revenues dwindle, because there is no political will to reduce government recurrent expenditure or to deal with grand corruption.  The political management of the Treasury is wanting with the new Minister of Finance having little interest or competence in technical work while his Assistant Minister is ineffective.  It is only public pressure therefore that will ensure that the public interest in a refocused national budget is fulfilled.  The approach proposed also serves to redirect political discourse towards an area of much needed reform – the National Budget.  This serves to demobilize those bent on fomenting tensions for political reasons by concentrating the public on bread and butter issues for their MPs to address.

Reasons for refocusing the Budget Debate: 
The Partnership for Change is concerned that while Kenyans continue to demand accountability from the Government of Kenya and Parliament on the management of our Public Resources, the Government and National Assembly continue to ignore the public resulting in massive wasteful expenditure and massive irresponsible borrowing.  There is a need to ensure that the next National Budget to be presented in June 2009 does not look like the last one.  The Partnership for Change will mobilize public opinion to ensure that the Budget is development focused rather than recurrent expenditure focused.

The National Budget as presently constituted is enmeshed in corrupt and wasteful expenditure and there is need for Kenyans to educate each other on this so that we can pressure our representatives to scrutinize the budget to identify such expenditure.  Savings can be used to boost development expenditure.  Mars Group’s analysis of the 2008/2009 budget points to numerous budget lines where Members of Parliament could have cut government expenditure: among these are the provisions in the national budget for foreign travel; fuel, utilities such as electricity and water; purchase and maintenance of motor vehicles; rent by the Government of premises; hospitality expenses; and taxation waivers and privileges of elected officials. Such waste has made the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals impossible and has in fact completely unbalanced the National Budget perhaps for years to come.   The Partnership for Change will use its national network to educate Kenyans on wasteful expenditure ahead of the budget and post budget to lobby MPs to scrutinize the budget presented in June by the Ministry of Finance.

The Budget 2009 Campaign:
The Partnership for Change is asking you to help us to campaign and encourage Kenyans to demand austerity measures and savings to be made in the National Budget, by Government and Parliament.  Money saved will be directed to the Development Budget. The Outcome will be to save approximately 200 Billion shillings, which if allocated to the Development Budget, will contribute enormously to Agenda 4 issues of the National Accord, such as unemployment, underdevelopment, starvation, food insecurity and impunity.

 

                  BUDGET CAMPAIGN 2009

Objective One – Rationalizing the size of the Central Government

What can YOU do?

You can advocate, and educate Kenyans on the need for a reduction in the size of the Government of Kenya; the enactment of a statute pursuant to section 16 of the Constitution to cap the number of Executive Cabinet Ministries; and the need for integrity criteria for public service. 

Why?

The Grand Coalition Government established after the National Accord is the largest and most expensive cabinet in Kenya’s history.  The economic situation requires the Government of Kenya to immediately demonstrate austerity measures, including the reduction of the number of ministries to a reasonable number.  At Independence there were 13 ministries today there are 43.  Kenyans cannot afford to maintain a bloated Cabinet of 93 Ministers and Assistant Ministers. Many of the 43 Ministries in the Grand Coalition Government have no developmental added value and are mere sinecure positions for The President and Prime Minister to fill.  The way forward is to bring section 16 of the Constitution into effect by enactment of a law capping the size of cabinet, as proposed by a motion sponsored by Ethuro Ekwe, and as already approved by the 9th Parliament.  This strategy has the additional potential benefit to the country of causing the exit of corrupt ministers within the Cabinet as part of the rationalization of the Grand Coalition Government.

Call to Action

Join The Partnership for Change campaign for a Lean, Clean and Efficient Cabinet and ask all Kenyans to

1. Campaign for a lean, clean cabinet – creating effective demand for reduction of the number of Cabinet Ministers and an insistence on integrity as a criteria for appointment to Cabinet
2. Campaign for Parliament to move to cap the number of ministries as per section 16 of the Constitution to 13, to remove future abuse by Appointing Authorities, and to thus reduce recurrent expenditure resulting from a bloated cabinet freeing up resources for development expenditure.
3. Campaign for lustration and removal of corrupt individuals from cabinet and public offices with immediate effect.

 

Objective two – Rationalizing the National Budget

What can YOU do?

You can advocate, and educate Kenyans on the need for reduction of the recurrent expenditure of Government and the setting of ceilings on recurrent expenditure with appropriate sanctions for public officers responsible for exceeding such ceilings; the need to monitor public expenditure at national level and to identify waste and corruption for the purposes of rationalizing the National Budget; and you can educate Kenyans on the need for an official policy requiring that at least 60% of the National Budget shall be allocated to development purposes and expenditure.

Why?

Government must adopt austerity measures to ensure that no money is wasted, and that all national financial resources are conserved for use in alleviating the plight of tens of millions who live below the poverty line, and the rest of Kenyans who are suffering high food costs and living with high inflation. One way of tightening the Government’s belt is to sieve through the budget for waste and extravagance.  Analysis of the 2008 and previous budgets point to numerous budget lines where Members of Parliament can cut government expenditure: among these are the provisions in the national budget for foreign travel; fuel, utilities such as electricity and water; purchase and maintenance of motor vehicles; rent by the Government of premises; hospitality expenses; and taxation waivers and privileges of elected officials. Such waste is making the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals more difficult if not impossible. All wasteful expenditure must be removed from the National Budget estimates to be presented to Parliament in June 2009. We believe the Estimates must reflect 60% in Development expenditure and 40% in recurrent Expenditure if the budget is to meet the current needs of the Kenyan People. Any Less will only make Kenyans’ lives worse, unbearable and totally without dignity in the coming year.

Call to Action

Join The Partnership for Change campaign for the budget in June 2009 to reflect 60% in Development expenditure and 40% in recurrent Expenditure and ask all Kenyans to

1. Campaign for Government to remove unnecessary or wasteful expenditure from the Recurrent Budget. For example how much sense is there in State House having an annual expenditure on fuel of over 1 million dollars for 149 cars?  Research using databases will identify where to trim the fat, and thus free up money for development expenditure.
2. Campaign for Parliament to disapprove wasteful expenditure proposals by the Government of Kenya. Parliament should reduce exaggerated or inappropriate budget estimates if Government fails to do so.
3. Campaign for Parliament to restore the system of checks-and-Balances and parliamentary oversight over the Kenya National Budget. There are not enough days provided in either the current or proposed new  Standing Orders of Parliament to debate all budget votes and most of the Ministry’s votes end up being passed un-debated through the so-called guillotine procedure. In effect taxation without representation.
4. Campaign for Government and Parliament to remove  bogus debts from the Kenya National Budget.
5. Campaign for reversing of the recurrent to development expenditure ratio in the Kenya National Budget. Kenyans want it to be 60:40 (Development: Recurrent) from June this year 2009.
6. Campaign for proper management of the public finances by every Member of Parliament and all public officers.
7. Campaign for Government to fulfill its fiduciary duty to ensure that there is proper management of our resources.
8. Campaign for the enactment of the Fiscal Management Act and the empowerment of the Parliamentary Budget Oversight Committees.

 

Objective three – Dealing with Corrupt Debt

What can YOU do?

You can advocate, and educate Kenyans on the need for full accountability and transparency in the External Public Debt Register which records all debts incurred by the Government of Kenya with international multi-lateral, bi-lateral and commercial creditors. You can advocate, and educate Kenyans on the position that transparency requires Kenyans to know what they owe, to whom they owe, and for what purpose they have a debt.  You can advocate, and educate Kenyans that there should be no further contracting of international debts unless and until the Government of Kenya accounts to the people of Kenya through Parliament by tabling the complete list of loans and debt registers for the period 1963 to date for public scrutiny.  You can  advocate, and educate Kenyans on the need to amended the law so that it is illegal for the Government to borrow without ex ante Parliamentary approval and full debate on the merits.

Why?

Kenya’s external debt stands at 1 trillion Shillings and much of this debt is corrupt and odious. The Government of Kenya must become accountable and transparent to the Public in the borrowing and implementation of the funds it borrows on behalf of the public. There is need to have corrupt loans on the Kenya External Public Debt Register purged immediately so that Kenya tax money is not being paid for bogus debts abroad. Such corrupt loans are easy to spot and we could start with all the Anglo Leasing debts and the Ken Ren Fertilizer Factory loans. The money saved would then be committed to development expenditure. Kenyans would like to seek Comprehensive debt relief where more money could be mobilized for development, if the international community were to adopt a policy to immediately forgive proven corruption related debt. There is need to petition the International community for 100% cancellation of all external debt that we can prove to be corrupt, and which are owed to entities in their jurisdictions. Kenyans can assist this Campaign by identifying externally funded projects that were never completed or were non existent.
The Partnership for Change will campaign for International assistance for support for the immediate cessation of repayment of corrupt external debt and the enforcement of law towards this end in their countries. The Campaign will call for the Government of Kenya to undertake to redirect money saved towards the development budget. This policy would be consistent with commitments to Kenya under the Millennium Development Goals.

Call to Action

Join The Partnership for Change campaign to mobilize public support so that the  Government of Kenya becomes accountable and transparent in the borrowing and implementation of the funds it borrows to the public and campaign on the need to have corrupt loans on the Kenya External Public Debt Register purged and ask all Kenyans to -

1. Campaign for An Independent Audit of the External Public Debt Register  whose results should be tabled in the National Assembly
2. Campaign for  corrupt loans on the Kenya External Public Debt Register to be purged immediately
3. Campaign for Comprehensive debt relief by requesting the International community to adopt a policy to immediately forgive proven corruption related debt
4. Campaign for a report from the Government of Kenya on pending litigation and threatened proceedings against the Government of Kenya on the basis of Sovereign debt be made and issued to the Public through the National Assembly
5. Campaign for the immediate retirement in the Public Interest of the Permanent Secretary, Treasury and the Head of Debt Management and immediate replacement of the two persons with Kenyans with appropriate credentials who can easily be found from within the Kenya Public Service.
6. Campaign for the adoption of a policy by bi-lateral and multi-lateral donors to strictly peg all future support to the Government of Kenya is pegged to accountability and transparency in the borrowing and implementation of the funds advanced
7. Campaign to pressure the Government of Kenya to request mutual legal assistance for international asset recovery and to take action to seize proceeds of corruption in Kenya

 

CALL TO ACTION: Join the Budget 2009 Campaign to save Agenda 4 of the National Accord.

The Partnership for Change seeks support for all Citizens of the Republic of Kenya and Friends of the Citizens of Kenya to join this National Campaign.
Activities you can easily accomplish to support this Campaign

1. Formal Statements and Letters to concerned Officials such as your Member of Parliament and the minister for Finance
2. Organizing Citizens meetings to discuss this issue
3. Organizing individual, group, and mass petitions
4. Organizing and participating in non violent protest and action

 

  About the Partnership for Change

The Partnership for Change is an open initiative of the Mars Group Kenya , the National Convention Executive Council, the National Youth Convention and other like-minded organizations, Civil Society Agencies, NGO’s, Youth groups, Faith Based Organisations, Social Movements and grass roots organization and Networks from all of the eight provinces of Kenya. The basic unit of the Partnership for Change is the Family.

The mission of the Partnership for Change is to advance the strategic use of non-violent action in calling upon the Kenyan Citizen to demand the End of Impunity, Restore Democratic accountability and to end Dictatorship in Kenya.

The six point agenda of the Partnership for Change can be read at http://marsgroupkenya.org/partnershipforchange/agenda.php

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