Nandi County Senator Kiprotich Arap Cherargei announced in his tweet that, ‘Kenya Kwanza (KK) Coalition Members of Parliament (MPs) who voted against the Finance Bill will face disciplinary actions by the party.

“The few elements within KK MPs who opposed the Bill shall face party KK disciplinary action,” the tweet read.

Cherargei champions Bill

Cherargei has been very vocal about the Finance Bill, making heavy statements regarding the amendments. “In an interview with a local TV station a week ago, the Nandi Senator said that they ‘the bill will pass even without any amendments. “We are not going to amend even a single comma,” Cherargei said.

During the interview, the senator accused opposition of ‘making Kenyans think the Finance Bill is something that came with Kenya Kwanza’.

According to Cherargei, Kenya has two options to be able to fund the country’s budget. In his view, the Finance Bill is ‘the best option Kenya has to avoid bad debt resulting from inflation and fund the budget without strain.

“There are two options that the country has at the moment. Either we continue borrowing, which is around Ksh. 3T as at now, and you know the appreciation of the Dollar against the Kenyan Shilling, affecting the external debt we have as a country.

“The other option is we raise our revenue locally. What this Finance Bill has done is to facilitate the government to run the budget, Cherargei added.

Wamuchomba to face disciplinary action.

Among the MPs who opposed the bill is Githunguri Member of Parliament, Peninah Gathoni Wamuchomba, who swore to ‘stand with the people, regardless of the consequences’. Even if they want to remove me from my parliamentary seat, I am ready,” Wamuchomba said.

Wamuchomba recently held a meeting with the residents of her constituency in Githunguri, to get their views on the Finance Bill. The residents told her to vote against the bill, which she obliged during the Finance Vote on Wednesday, June 14, 2023. “I am ready to be called all sorts of names for standing with my people,” Wamuchomba exclaimed yesterday.

Going by the tweet shared by Cherargei, Wamuchomba and other MPs who opposed the bill are in hot soup, as they will have to ‘face party disciplinary action’.

Finance Bill, Debt and Budget.

The country’s debt, the Finance Bill and the 2023/2024 Budget are topics that are in the mouths of many, patiently waiting to see what will transpair. Jimmy Wanjigi, a political strategist and entrepreneur, has claimed that ‘what Kenya Kwanza is trying to achieve is the amount collected by both the Former Presidents Mwai Kibaki and Uhuru Kenyatta during their regimes.

“It is an impossible target and it has never been done. Kibaki was there for 10 years and cumulatively he took a tax revenue inherited from President Moi of Ksh.200 billion and by the time he exited he had accumulated a tax revenue of Ksh.1 trillion.

“Uhuru Kenyatta then took over and cumulatively we have reached Ksh.900 billion over 10 years. Now Kenya Kwanza is saying that in just one year we can achieve a target that has never been achieved,” Wanjigi said during an interview at a local TV station.

As the 2023/2024 budget is set to be read by the National Treasury & Economic Planning Cabinet Secretary Njunguna Ndung’u, Kenyans now await the third reading of the Finance Bill which is set to take place on Tuesday, June 20, 2023.

In addition, all eyes are now on the Kenya Kwanza Party, to see the disciplinary action the party will met on the party MPs who voted against the bill, based on Cherargei’s remarks.