The President of the Republic of Kenya Dr. William Ruto today addressed a joint sitting in the parliament, being his first state of the nation address since he was elected.
In his address as required by the constitution of Kenya in article 132 where the President addresses both houses on all the measures taken and the progress achieved in the realisation of the national values, referred to in article 10, and this is done once every year and any other time, the President addressed the nation where Kenyans are experiencing high cost of living due to the increase of price on basic commodities leading to the increase of tax.
The President said the journey to transform the country’s economy is positive and assured Kenyans that the country is on the right track.
He said as a country, the hard decisions are taken hence painful choices because as a government they owe it to Kenyans to do the right thing and confront facts as they are without flinching or equivocating.
He said in Kenya Kwanza’s plan, three primary challenges were identified, external shock, fiscal distress and structural imbalances that heavily strained the economy causing nationwide difficulty where he said the Covid-19 pandemic coupled with global supply chain disruptions and geopolitical conflicts significantly raised inflation and interest rates affecting the economy and said prolonged drought led to food shortages.
The Head of State said that as a country, Kenyans have been living large and way beyond their means as he added that time has come to retire the false comforts and illusion benefits of wasteful expenditure and counterproductive subsidies on consumption whereby the country dug itself deeper into the hole of avoidable debt saying by December he will be able to settle the first Kshs 300 million dollars or 500 billion installment of the us dollar 2 billion Eurobond debt that falls due next year, assuring Kenyans that the country will pay the debt that has become a source of concern to markets, citizens and partners.
He said the education system must develop a formidable reservoir of skill talent and highly competitive and innovative human capital to support the vision of an economically transformed Kenya saying more than 56,000 new teachers have been employed while more than 8,000 primary school teachers were retrained to equip them with the capacity to effectively deliver learning and teaching at junior school level.
He said in keeping his promise to the people of Kenya , he signed important instruments on his first day in office, among them the delayed appointment of six judges to the Court of Appeal recommended by the Judicial Service Commission, enhanced allocation to the Judiciary by Kshs 3 billion, designated the Inspector General as the accounting officer of the national police service to enhance independence and subsequently appointed a task-force led by former Chief Justice David Maraga, to review the terms and conditions of service of members of the National Police Service.
He said he has worked hard every day to move the agenda of his government forward amid challenges.
He thanked the co-chairs in the bipartisan process of the national dialogue that has enabled leaders to find common ground on many of the issues whose resolution will accelerate the transformation.
According to article 132 of the constitution of Kenya the President shall publish in the Gazette the details of the measures and progress, and submit a report for debate to the National Assembly on the progress made in fulfilling the international obligations of the Republic.
