Nairobi — The Public Service Commission has announced 106 fresh government job vacancies despite declaring that it has halted the recruitment of public servants.

During the presentation of the 2024-2025 budget highlights in the middle of last month, the former Treasury Cabinet Secretary Njuguna Ndung'u announced that in the next year, the government will halt employment in the public service to control the country's rising waging bill.

The CS said that during the employment suspension, the government will then conduct an audit to sanitize the public payrolls and also eliminate ghost workers.

The new vacancies are scattered among 10 state departments and ministries, including lands and physical planning, forestry, blue economy and fisheries, mining, transport, cooperatives, labor and skill development, gender affirmative action, youth affairs and creative economy, and sports.

"There will be suspension of all new recruitment in the public sector for the next one year," he said.

Earlier this month, the then Public Service Cabinet Secretary Moses Kuria stressed that the suspension of new recruitment in the public sector is requisite to control the country's expenditure on benefits for public servants, which exceeds sustainable levels.

Highlighting the strain on the national budget, President Ruto revealed on April 7 this year that a substantial portion of the annual revenue, approximately Sh1.1 trillion out of Sh2.2 trillion, is allocated towards salaries and allowances.

"It's imperative that we adopt a prudent approach to financial management. We cannot sustainably allocate funds beyond our means," he reiterated.