The country is facing a massive projected fiscal deficit amounting to a whooping Sh515billion in 2024/2025 financial year, National Treasury Principal Secretary Dr. Chris Kiptoo told parliament.
Kiptoo made the shocking disclosure yesterday while appearing before the National Assembly Public Debt and Privatisation Committee.
Committee Members led by chairperson who also doubles as the Balambala legislators Abdi Shurie Omar grilled the PS and his team on a raft of other public debt related matters, including the Treasury’s plans to lower the national debt portfolio, as well as strategies to cut on unnecessary government expenditures to minimize borrowing.
This comes at a time Kenyans are outraged by ballooning public wage bill and extravagant expenditure by government against the backdrop of punitive tax regime that has added burden on the impoverished taxpayers.
The PS told Members of Parliament (MPs) that the said deficit would be financed through domestic borrowing of Sh258.9billion and a projected external borrowing of Sh256.8billion.
According to Kiptoo, the public debt as at April 30, 2024 stood at Sh10.5trillion representing 65.3 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
