Trimming the fat

Our MP’s have proven once again that they are arsonists whose day time job is as firefighters. They assume we’ve forgotten that the finance bill was passed by them, so for them to come out shocked and raging at the President is a premier episode of the theatre of the absurd.

They are fighting a fire they nursed into an inferno. Parliament must begin to be honest with the Kenyan people and for once do what they should have done in the first place.

Salary reductions

What they need to do first is to take salary reductions. Parliament costs us around Sh34 billion, which is almost double what our judiciary costs. This, of course, is a blatant mis-prioritisation of national issues. The MPs who are the only ones who dictate their own pay, have plundered this nation long enough. While at it, CDF is in my mind unconstitutional and misleading to Kenyans. CDF entrenches the worship of MPs and confirms them as hand-out kings instead of thought leaders and legislators.

The fact is we need to fund devolution more and MPs need to be lawmakers, not governors of little fiefdoms.

If they are to be honest, MPs must trim the fat in their own house before they ask anyone else to tighten their belts. MPs per diem earnings on foreign trips are ungodly, amounting to millions per MP, MCAs net half a million in five days when they travel. It is no wonder then that much of their time is spent out of the country and if in the country then lobbying for a trip out of the country.

33 per cent lost after all...

This simply means that we spend billions in foreign trips and gain little from it. These bench-marking trips, never return a dividend on our investment and are simply trips for pigs to sample mud. The benefits to Wanjiku are reduced to her being part of the entertainment the said MP would like to carry with him.

The 16 per cent fuel tax is not as big a pain as the 33 per cent tax we pay to the lords of corruption. If the Auditor General is to be believed, Kenya loses one third of her budget to corruption.

This is a huge sum. Huge enough to pay our national debt in just five years, huge enough to reduce the tax to near zero. If our MPs are genuine let them enact laws against corruption. Civil forfeiture, which some argue may be unconstitutional, should be enacted as a law in this country.

Any Kenyan found with cash or assets they can’t explain how they received the same, should be forced to surrender the same. Politicians have been known to donate millions every month. Wealth should stop being a secret.

If you can’t explain, let it be taken away. Isn’t that how our mothers taught us propriety? If you came home with a toy that was not yours, your mom instituted civil forfeiture and the toy was taken from you. This should be the law of this land.

Parliament should also enact a law that forces all state agencies to reduce their budgets by 15 per cent. Simply because our recurrent expenditure is ridiculous, we have flowers and carpets and serviettes on our expenditure. For some reason, government departments buy new computers and printers every financial year, yet we know they last more than a year.

This is an avenue for the corrupt to keep being fed, an avenue we must close and save our nation billions. I am reliably  informed that if we did this, we would save up to 30 per cent of our budget as such, 15 per cent must surely be possible.

Empower, educate

MPs should also begin to empower and educate the masses on the need to pay tax. Only about 4 million Kenyans pay tax, the rest don’t. As such the economic burden is skewed and heavy for those who pay.

Parliament should concern itself with the business of legislating new and innovative ways of raising taxes. Of incentivising the informal sector to go formal. A path of making it easy for small businesses to employ staff full time and pay PAYE at a workable rate. This requires creativity and a heart for the nation that this Parliament may lack.

But then MPs will spend more time trying to save CDF, save the funds for their trips, and keep their five star catering going. With mouths full of food and stomachs engorged with the fat of this nation, they will want to pretend they are protecting the sheep.

Some will pretend we don’t need the 16 per cent fuel tax, promise us heaven while they eat everything in sight.

The truth is we have only two choices: to pay the new tax as dictated by the Finance Bill 2018, once it is law, or to direct our anger and ire where it is meant to be. At our high flying, chauffeur driven, and highly secured MPs. These are the fellows who are brewing the poisonous stew.

They hold the poisoned chalice in their hands and we must recognise for certain that we can’t sit by and let them do as they please with our nation. They need to create laws that fight corruption, that trim budgetary largesse and finally help the government raise finances from all not just a few.

Mr Bichachi is a Communication Consultant. [email protected]