Treasury Cabinet Secretary (CS), Njuguna Ndung’u is set to table the 2024/2025 budget before the National Assembly today (Thursday).
The budget entails two bills: the Appropriation Bill 2024/25 and the unpopular Finance Bill 2024/2025. The Appropriation Bill consists of the estimates of government expenditure.
The Finance Bill on the other end comprises of proposals of how the government entails to raise its proposed expenditures. This is through taxation, user fees for government services and grants hence why it is unpopular.
The reading of the KSh 4Tr budget in the words of The Budget and Appropriations Committee chair Ndindi Nyoro (Kiharu), in an interview with TV47, is ceremonial.
This is because since the promulgation of the 2010 Constitution, the role of budget making became a responsibility of Parliament in consultation with the National Treasury.
“The process of the making of the budget will be complete next week when Parliament passes the Appropriation Bill,” said Mr Nyoro.
The Finance Bill 2024/2025 is expected to be passed and assented into law by President William Ruto by 1 July 2024.
Men will not be responsible for wives’ taxes
Men will not be legally responsible for their wives’ income tax obligations incase the 50-year-old law will be repealed as proposed in the Finance Bill 2024/25.
The proposal in the Finance Bill, 2024 suggested deleting the definition of a wife’s employment, income, professional and self-employment, income rate from the Act.
The proposed change in the Finance Bill, is actually a clean-up provision that aims to reflect the societal changes where everyone is individually responsible for their own taxes.
Currently, Kenya is relying on a 50-year-old law that considers wives as dependents of their husbands. It means that if a wife fails to pay her income tax, the husband is held responsible, including facing fines or even potential jail time.
“It presupposes that the income of a married woman living with her husband for purposes of ascertaining his total income and is therefore assessed on that basis and tax there on charged,” tax expert at Bowmans say in a Finance Bill, 2024 analysis.
