Senior public officials snub State House-led pay cut drive

What you need to know:

The Transformative Fund, which holds pay cuts for top public servants, has received only Sh30 million over a period of 15 months.

The account holding pay cuts for President Uhuru Kenyatta, his deputy and top public servants has only Sh30 million over a period of 15 months, signalling that senior public officers have opted not to trim their salaries.

Treasury secretary Henry Rotich said that not all public officers had ceded money to the account —Transformative Fund — whose savings would be used on development projects.

“The figure that we are looking at is Sh30 million in the account,” Mr Rotich said in an interview with Citizen TV last week, adding that the cuts were voluntary.

The pay cuts ranged between five per cent and 20 per cent and targeted Cabinet secretaries, principal secretaries and parastatal heads, who are estimated at more than 200.

Cabinet secretaries had pledged to voluntarily reduce their salaries by 10 per cent.

This means that the account should be holding about Sh70 million from deductions made on the pay of Cabinet and principal secretaries without including cuts ceded by chief executives of state- owned firms.

In March last year, Mr Kenyatta and his deputy, William Ruto, pledged to take a 20 per cent pay cut as part of broader efforts to reduce the ballooning public wage bill and free up cash for investment to spur economic growth.

READ: Uhuru, Ruto to take 20pc pay cut in bid to tame huge wage bill

The Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) had raised the red flag over the unsustainable annual wage bill topping Sh500 billion, saying recurrent expenditure was growing at the expense of development spending.

Mr Kenyatta also directed heads of parastatals to follow suit and take a 20 per cent pay cut to reduce the wage bill. He warned that those who defied the order would be sacked.

The Treasury in March last year opened the account at the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) where all deductions from salaries of Mr Kenyatta, Mr Ruto, Cabinet secretaries, principal secretaries and parastatal chiefs’ were to be deposited.

“The Transformative Fund will also include savings from restrictions on foreign travel, hotel accommodation and other non-core expenditures,” Treasury principal secretary Kamau Thugge had said earlier.

Mr Kenyatta, who is entitled to Sh1.7 million per month, is supposed to earn Sh1.36 million monthly after the 20 per cent cut while Mr Ruto, entitled to Sh1.49 million, is to get Sh1.19 million.

Cabinet secretaries who earn Sh1.12 million have to forfeit Sh112,000 if they volunteer to have a pay cut and principal secretaries Sh91,000 from their Sh910,000 pay.

State officers have to first write to the Sarah Serem-led SRC declaring that they are ceding a share of their pay.

The Judicial Service Commission (JSC), which pays salaries for judges and magistrates, and the Parliamentary Service Commission (PSC), which is in charge of the emolument of MPs, were also challenged to follow suit and reduce the salaries of senior civil servants and other public servants.