NATIONAL Treasury CS John Mbadi presented the budget highlights and revenue raising measures to Parliament for the year financial year 2025-26 last Thursday.
The CS spoke of a wide range of priorities that will be funded in the Sh4.3 trillion budget. This included focus areas in health, education, affordable housing, social protection programmes such as Inua Jamii, allocation to counties and wider funding for Bottom-Up Economic Empowerment programmes.
However, there are several important priorities and issues that were missing from his speech.
First, the CS mentioned that the government used the zero-budgeting approach to prepare the 2025-26 budget. This was adopted by the Cabinet in early 2024 to support government efforts to rationalise its spending as part of its fiscal consolidation efforts.
This is a key strategy that the government has identified to manage the deficit and improve efficiency in government finances.
However, the CS did not provide details on how much revenue had been “freed” up in the eight months or so since the budget formulation process began or the overall impact of the measures taken.
Secondly, the speech was silent on the devolution of functions that were identified in the process led by the Inter-Governmental Relations Technical Committee alongside the associated funding of Sh272 billion.
The Gazette notice that was published by IGRTC in 2024 highlighted devolved services that needed to move to county governments with requisite resources.
The CS should have provided details of the process that will be followed for the transfer of these functions and how it will be done, and how the resources will be devolved as well.
Finally, Kenyans have raised concerns on the role of public participation in the formulation and approval of public budgets. This is a key gap in the relationship between citizens and the state and has led to reduced public trust.
The speech to Parliament provided an opportunity for the CS to report on how citizens were consulted during the budget formulation process, how widespread the engagements were across the country, and how public input influenced the final decisions presented in the consolidated budget to the National Assembly.
While the three issues did not find prominence in the budget speech, they are key areas of accountability that as Kenyans we should focus on as we start to implement the budget for 2025-26.
The writer is Bajeti Hub deputy executive director
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