End of Moi perks lead State to save Sh100m monthly

The late President Daniel arap Moi. FILE PHOTO | NMG

By JOHN MUTUA
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Summary

• Taxpayers saved Sh100 million monthly in the quarter to September on the back of withdrawing retirement benefits and staff attached to the late President Daniel arap Moi.
• The Controller of Budget has disclosed that pay and perks made to constitutional office holders and the retired presidents dropped to Sh655.27 million in the three months September from Sh985.5 million, reflecting a drop of Sh330.23 million.

Taxpayers saved Sh100 million monthly in the quarter to September on the back of withdrawing retirement benefits and staff attached to the late President Daniel arap Moi.

The Controller of Budget has disclosed that pay and perks made to constitutional office holders and the retired presidents dropped to Sh655.27 million in the three months September from Sh985.5 million, reflecting a drop of Sh330.23 million.

“The reduction in the budget provisions compared to a similar period financial year 2019/20 was instigated by a lower budget for the Auditor-General and the office of the former presidents following the death of the second president of Kenya,” Controller of Budget Margaret Nyakang’o disclosed in a report tabled in Parliament.

Kenya went without an Auditor-General for over 10 months to October last year after Edward Ouko retired in August 2019, eliminating from the budget the public auditor’s pay estimated at an average of Sh1.8 million per month.

This is a pointer that the bulk of the Sh330.23 million drop in pay expenditure was linked to the retirement benefits associated with the office of former President Moi, who died in February last year.

Mr Moi’s juicy retirement benefits were paid from two offices. His pension was paid from the Treasury and disclosed as a combined figure with that of President Mwai Kibaki, which stood at Sh111 million in the year to June 2019.

The former president had been receiving retirement benefits since leaving office in 2002, including a hefty monthly pension equivalent to 80 percent of the salary paid to the sitting president, a fleet of luxury cars, a fully furnished office and about 40 workers.

He was also entitled to other perks like fuel, house and entertainment allowances running into hundreds of thousands of shillings.

Other benefits, including purchase of luxury cars, office space and equipment and dozens of aides, are paid from the Presidency budget.

Mr Moi had about 40 staff at taxpayers’ expense, including personal assistants, secretaries, messengers, drivers and bodyguards.

The Treasury cut the annual budget for salaries and allowances for constitutional office holders to Sh4.17 billion in the year to June 2021 from Sh4.64 billion in similar period last year following Mr Moi’s death and the absence of an Auditor-General between August 2019 to September last year.

Mr Ouko retired in August 2019 but Parliament took more than 10 months to appoint his successor, a gap that led to the cut in budgetary allocation for salary and allowances for the office.

Mr Moi came to power in 1978 after Kenya’s founding president Mzee Jomo Kenyatta died. He remained in power until the end of 2002.

Retirement benefits for former presidents have come under heavy criticism on grounds that they left office as rich men with property worth billions of shillings and vast business interests.

In 2015, a High Court judge stopped the government from paying allowances to the former presidents after finding that they were an unnecessary expense.

The Attorney-General has since appealed the decision, allowing the two to continue enjoying their retirement emoluments.