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Kenya: Grand Cabinet to Cost Billions
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The Citizen (Dar es Salaam)
1 May 2008
Posted to the web 1 May 2008
Jeff Otieno
Nairobi
Taxpayers in Kenya will pay Ksh33 billion to fund the grand coalition Cabinet in the next two months alone.
Some of the money will be shifted from programmes with major social implications, including the building of new hospitals and road rehabilitation.
The programmes had been factored into the Budget for the current financial year which ends in June.
The high cost of managing the expanded Cabinet became clear in a mini-budget presented by Finance minister Amos Kimunya in Parliament Tuesday..
Besides shifting money from key programmes, the Government will have to come up with new measures to raise an extra Ksh22.3 billion to meet the costs of running the new ministries and pay for other priority needs, including resettling internal refugees and mitigating against the effects of post-election violence.
The appointment of a record number of 42 ministers in the grand coalition formed by President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga ignored calls by civil society and other groups for a lean Cabinet.
Parliament is expected to endorse Mr Kimunya's estimates to enable the new ministries carry out their functions before the next Budget is read in mid-June.
The extra funds will finance the new office of the Prime Minister, which is to get Ksh243.9 million as recurrent vote and 183.4 million for development, bringing the total to Ksh427.3 million.
The PM's office, whose role is to supervise and coordinate government affairs, was created after the signing of the National Accord that allowed for power-sharing between President Kibaki's PNU and Mr Odinga's ODM.
The President had already appointed 17 ministers from PNU and its partners in Kanu and ODM Kenya, but then expanded the Cabinet to incorporate the former opposition ODM. This made it necessary to split several ministries and create some new ones.
Among the entirely new dockets are the Ministry of Nairobi Metropolitan Development headed by Mr Mutula Kilonzo, which gets Ksh41.5 million, and the Ministry of Development of Northern Kenya and other Arid Lands, headed by Mr Ibrahim Elmi Mohamed that gets Ksh42.4 million for recurrent expenditure and Ksh1.8 billion for various projects.
Most of the others were split from existing ministries.
They include the Forestry and Wildlife ministry that will need Ksh3.2 billion to pay salaries and other expenses and Ksh1.5 billion as development expenditure
The Medical Services ministry headed by Prof Anyang' Nyong'o has been allocated Ksh102.2 million as recurrent expenditure.
It has not been allocated funding for development. It was formerly part of the Ministry of Health.
The Ministry of Industrialisation headed by Mr Henry Kosgey is to get Ksh1.17 billion as recurrent and Ksh503 million for its development expenditures.
Some of the money is expected to come from the Trade ministry under Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta.
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He will be asked to surrender Ksh950.9 million.
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