The three arms of government, constitutional commissions and independent offices now have slightly smaller budgets for the current fiscal year after President William Ruto signed the Supplementary Appropriations Bill into law on Monday.
- The budget reduces the national government’s budget by KSh40 billion for recurrent expenditure and KSh105 billion in development expenditure.
- The Executive’s budget has been cut by KSh139.81 billion, while Parliament has lost KSh3.7 billion and the Judiciary KSh2.1 billion.
- Budgets for State House and the Office of the Deputy President were cut by KSh6 billion, and National Treasury by KSh7 billion.
President William Ruto assented to the Supplementary Appropriations Bill on Monday after it was passed by the National Assembly on July 31, 2024.
Allocation to the Ministry of Health was reduced by KSh6.9 billion, but the law allocates KSh16.2 billion to funding health sector reforms. It also includes KSh20 billion to support farmers and KSh120.7 billion to support ongoing education reforms.
The new law has also budgeted KSh3.5 billion for the enhancement of remuneration for security officers.
The budget cuts are part of the austerity measures announced by President Ruto after the rejection of the Finance Bill 2024, which was meant to raise KShs. 344.3bn.
Public finance laws allow for supplementary budgets for “unforeseen and unavoidable” circumstances such as the current situation, but there has been criticism in recent years that they are often used to rationalise ambitious revenue targets in the main budget cycle.
“While in-year budget changes are necessary to respond to emerging issues, such provisions should not be misused as an opportunity to alter the original policy objectives or to introduce new projects or programmes without robust public participation and Parliamentary approval,” the Institute of Public Finance wrote in 2023 when a supplementary budget originally meant to reduce the budget by KShs 300bn instead increased it by KShs. 36bn.
