For the umpteenth time, the Government has instituted yet another pending bills verification committee.

The Cabinet set up a committee to supposedly go through the long-standing pending bills.

This news is so frustrating to thousands of long-suffering businesspeople whose only crime was to supply goods and services to the Government, both at national and county levels. The pending bills ping pong, now running close to a decade, continues unabated.

Nothing has changed. The Cabinet committee is just a ploy to provide a place to park what has become a very inconvenient subject that Government mandarins don’t want to deal with- pending bills.

The truth is, there is no need for another verification committee. The pending bills have been verified ad nauseum. Businesspeople have gone through this circus time and again. They are exhausted.

Affected businesspeople have trooped to these verification committees over the last five years to distraction. Indeed, in counties like Nairobi City, a high-powered committee led by former anti-corruption boss, PLO Lumumba, was appointed to bring to finality the veracity of every pending bill.

Why this circus now, unless it is an admission these former committees were just set up to “eat” public funds?

No! Not another verification committee. This looks suspiciously like a ploy to kick this can further down the road! Take ownership. You are now in Government.

What is worse is that this money, when, and if, it is ever paid, will be without interest. Given the raging inflation in the country in recent years, the value of those pending payments have been degraded by factors of up to 50 per cent. Do not worsen the situation.

President William Ruto has in the last one month cleared all arrears to counties and stipends for old people. Further, he is floating bonds to pay off the billions owed to oil companies over the subsidy scheme. He now wants to start degrading the upcoming Eurobond payment of $2 billion, which is almost four times the pending bills. But it looks like pending bills is where he draws the line.

These long-suffering businesses are not asking for the Government to reach into its back pocket and shell out the Kshs 640 billion they are owed in one tranche. But a year into this administration, there should be a payment plan, just like the plan that enabled Government to clear all arrears to counties.

So, draw a plan, pay Kshs 100 billion every month within the next six months and clear the bills. It’s even in the Government’s own interest. Such money injected into the thousands of businesses owed would cause an immediate response in terms of economic activity and demand stimulation. The multiplier effect of this money will reverberate across the economy.

Further, only full settlement of pending bills will restore faith in the Local Purchase Order (LPO), the official document used by the Government as a contract to requisition goods and services. The LPO used to be equivalent to a bankers cheque, and banks had no hesitation accepting the document as security against which to give business advances. Now, the LPO is viewed with a lot of suspicion.

The same committee is supposed to propose a mechanism to stop pending bills in the future. This is a waste of the committee’s time. Just go back to President Mwai Kibaki’s era and pick up that formbook which says that no Government agency will procure unless the LPO is fully funded. Government accountants who delay payments on flimsy excuses must be disciplined. The Cabinet Secretary in the

Treasury, this is your docket, and you are failing in it! But now, back to the elephant in the room.

Mr President, just like you took personal charge of ensuring all monies owed to counties were paid, take charge of clearing pending bills now.

These long suffering businesses don’t want another verification committee. They want to hear you utter the words you did when your Government cleared all arrears to counties. “ I don’t owe them a dime.” — [email protected]