The ghosts of untaken macroeconomic reforms haunting Kenya

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Columnist

As critics punch holes in Kenya’s Finance Bill 2026, they only scratch the surface of a severely flawed fiscus, predatory and extractive and biased against impoverished low-income Kenyans.

Riddled with dependent parastatals, kneejerk preconceived supplementary budgets, and irrational taxation, it hobbles and bleeds a tiny fraction of the formal working population. How did Kenyans become the proverbial milk cows?

Incomplete reforms: For an overhaul, the Presidential Task Force on Parastatal Reforms (March 2013-November 2013) and the Parastatal Reforms Implementation Committee, November 2013-December 2014, reconfigured public finances and drains from parastatals.