Mbadi’s comments point to skunk in Ruto’s team
By Samuel Kariuki, July 28, 2025One year after his appointment to the Cabinet, John Mbadi has continued to expose bureaucratic inefficiency over controversial remarks about critical public sectors that touch on the lives of many Kenyans.
Last week, his blunt remarks on free education funding being unsustainable ignited a fierce public discontent that has cast a long shadow on Mbadi’s tenure as National Treasury Cabinet Secretary.
While appearing before the National Assembly Education Committee, Mbadi revealed that not only had the government reduced capitation for secondary school learners from Ksh22,400 to about Ksh16,000, but it was also considering abolishing free primary education because there is no money to run the programme from the public coffers.
“The truth of the matter is, we don’t have the capacity to finance Free Primary Education and Free Day Secondary education. Let us not live a lie, the budget we approve cannot provide the Sh22,244 required per learner. This is not possible,” said Mbadi.
“The thing is, we have been underfunding the education sector. The government is failing to do this because of other competing needs, such as the debt repayments, which we have been making as they are too high compared to before.”
If Mbadi’s opinion is upheld, the decision would affect a large percentage of Kenyan children aged between five and 19, the age group expected to be in primary and secondary schools, estimated to be more than 22 million.
Ogamba defence
Sensing the damage caused by Mbadi’s remark, his Education counterpart, Julius Ogamba, who had accompanied him in Parliament, moved to right the wrongs on Saturday.
Through a statement, Ogamba stated that Free and Compulsory Basic education is a constitutional right of every child, as per Article 53 of the Constitution adding that the government has no intention nor the power to abrogate this sacrosanct right.
“To address the current resource gap, the Ministry of Education and the National Treasury will continue to proactively lobby the National Assembly to allocate more resources for this and other education programmes, to ensure that all learners are funded at the approved rates. The Government will work to fulfil its duty of providing access to quality education for all our children,” the statement read in part.
Education sector appears to be problematic for Mbadi’s balance sheet. In August last year, he was quick to assert that the Exchequer had no money to employ the 20,000 teachers, but later retracted his statement on claims that he was ill-informed on the budgetary allocation status for the JSS teachers.
It is in Parliament that CS Mbadi has found a safe haven to expose the government’s complacency in tackling the very issues that sparked the historic protests over bad governance last year.
In March, while appearing before the National Assembly Budget and Appropriations Committee, the CS made a bizarre recommendation on allowing money acquired illegally through corruption should be ploughed back into the economy.
Invest locally
If corruption cannot be fought, he told the members of the committee, it was better to allow people who got the illicit money to invest locally in a bid to create jobs for Kenyans and grow the economy.
“If we cannot fight corruption and rout it out, we’d better allow people who have illicit money to invest it here, because they escape to Dubai and developing countries to employ people there,’’ Mbadi stated.
This remark did not only overrun the mandate of Kenya’s anti-graft body, Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC), but it also insinuated that the government should turn a blind eye to corruption, a costly move in the delivery of public services.
While justifying why the loot of national resources should be invested locally, Cabinet Secretary Mbadi posed: “ What if that money, which is building a mall in Tanzania is from a Kenyan, was building a mall here? How many Kenyans would be employed?”
He added: “I say, this is the most desirable way to fight corruption and root it out.”
Mbadi took over Treasury at a time when his boss, President William Ruto, was under siege following deadly Gen-Zs’ protests, who had pushed him to drop the 2024 Finance Bill, which had proposed punitive taxes on Kenyans who were already struggling with the high cost of living.
The youth were also demanding the sacking of senior government officials involved in the mismanagement of public resources and corruption, while majority of Kenyans were hard hit by unemployment and economic hardship.
Hustler narrative
Many Gen Z Kenyans, particularly those who supported President Ruto based on his “hustler” narrative of empowering the majority poor, felt deeply betrayed by the lavish lifestyles of government officials.
The stark contrast between the struggles of ordinary citizens and the visible wealth of politicians was seen as a direct repudiation of the promises made during campaigns.
When the President tapped him to control the national purse, his party Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) was buoyed by the appointment, terming him as an expert who would enable the government to steady the economy.
Before joining the government, Mbadi had served as a Member of Parliament from 2013 to 2022, serving as the Suba South MP for two terms and was nominated after the 2022 general elections by ODM.
He was the Leader of the Minority between 2017 to 2022, and he also served as the Public Accounts Committee of the National Assembly.
But Mbadi joined the same government he fiery critiqued, especially after President Ruto appointed his members of the cabinet and their names were tabled in Parliament in October following their vetting. He termed the cabinet secretaries as ‘deficient in all ways’ and proceeded to implore the lawmakers to reject the entire list.
“There are only eight of the 24 picks who are qualified to be in Cabinet, while the rest are incompetent, unqualified, have integrity issues, and cannot install transformative reforms. We have a choice to make either decision to reject over 60 per cent of these names or give President Ruto his skunk. These are not people who can run the government,” Mbadi said.