Taxes: If you can pay, pay!
Taxes should be proportionate and those who can afford must and should pay as a matter of national duty.
The elite are making noises about the increase in taxes. It has become a political statement. Kenya’s elite are de-bating the merits, and also attempting all manners to avert an increase in taxes. And yet, the real hustlers are confused. They are totally lost.
While walking in Kibera, where I grew up, I was invited into a middle-aged woman’s house for evening por-ridge. This woman had questions. Nyakano cares more about skyrocketing cost of basic commodities and says the government should be focusing on how to make life easy for mwananchi.
For instance, unga is now retailing at Sh220 per two-kilogramme packet, up from Sh110 some time last year, and sugar at Sh140 per kilogramme, up from Sh100. Not to mention the cost of cooking oil and kerosene, which have doubled in the past year.
My conversation with Nyakano left me thinking deeply about this debate on taxes.
The real hustlers don’t understand where the money goes. To be fair, the poor are taxed heavily. According to research by Glassdoor, a firm that connects job seekers and potential employers worldwide, the average security guard in Kenya earns Sh15,000, before NSSF and NHIF deductions. This man is left with about Sh13,000, which is hardly enough to cater for his needs. Then, all the goods a mama mboga buys are taxed at 16 per cent VAT.
The poor are, truly, crying.
The poor are asking, Your Excellency Mr President, as you campaign on taxes, please can you tell them what they will get in return? If the status quo remains the same, then you have lost. If the garbage truck will come to pick the taka taka in our slums, then you are on the right path. If a poor woman from Kibera with a dying baby still cannot access healthcare, then you are doomed to fail. When our hospitals do not have enough doctors, nurses and medicines, where are the taxes going?
The answer? A huge percentage of our national budget is spent on salaries. On travel—we had over 100 dele-gates attend the COP26 climate summit, more than the host country, Egypt. We have to look ourselves squarely in the eye and ask, can we afford, as a country, to have such significant recurrent expenditure? Can we afford an expensive Parliament, country governments, parastatals...the list goes on.
Or, are we mortgaging our children’s tomorrow, not to mention that the poor do not see and experience the ben-efits of this wage bill? They are crying for basic services—healthcare, roads, water, electricity and housing.
The poor are suffering and they have reached the boiling point. Mr President, change the narrative that money will come back to the communities. Mama mboga, boda boda riders and the ghetto youth want services in their communities.
In the same token, those who can, must and should pay taxes. This money still deserves a clear plan for how those taxes are changing our country for the better. Taxes should be proportionate and those who can afford them must and should pay as a matter of national duty.
If you come up with a clear plan, I will lead the campaign for debt relief for Kenya, for the Kenyans not to tie their belts until it starts hurting the bones.
Mr Odede, the founder and CEO of Shofco, is a member of USAid Advisory Board. [email protected].
