This archive report was first published on 5 May 2020.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread in Kenya, the country's lawmakers and judges are feeling the pinch of reduced allowances. According to Treasury Secretary Henry Yatani, the Judiciary will save Sh754.5 million in pay savings, mainly due to reduced perks offered to judges.
Yatani informed MPs during the review of the national Budget for the year to June that the rationalisation of the recurrent budget has resulted in savings of Sh850 million for Parliament. He attributed these savings to restrictions imposed to contain the spread of COVID-19, including reduced domestic and foreign travel, training, and workshops, as well as reduced activities based on guidelines for working from home.
The entire civil service is expected to save billions of shillings following the order to work from home, which has drastically changed the way business is conducted. Employers have pushed their staff to work from home, and the government has suspended international passenger travel, closed schools indefinitely, and imposed a daily dusk-to-dawn curfew to curb the spread of the virus.
Parliament suspended all foreign travel effective March 13 and directed that all conferences, retreats, and workshops be held within its precincts in Nairobi. Committee meetings have also been reduced, save for those that touch on budget and health, which are critical in allocating money and shaping policy decisions in the fight against Coronavirus.
Lawmakers earn Sh5,000 per committee session, with chairpersons earning Sh8,000. They also earn a per diem of Sh18,000 per day for meetings held in big towns like Mombasa and Kisumu and Sh10,500 in small urban centres. Juicy perks are offered for foreign trips, depending on countries, with lawmakers travelling to the US, for instance, being paid a daily subsistence allowance of Sh63,312 ($658).
Annually, the total cost of these salaries and allowances stands at Sh15.7 billion, exerting pressure on the ballooning Kenyan public sector wage bill. This has cemented MPs' status as super earners.
Similarly, judges, like MPs, earn Sh18,200 as per diem, and those that serve in the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) earn a sitting allowance of Sh40,000 per meeting, with the vice-chairperson and chair taking home Sh45,000 per meeting respectively.
Under the directive to work from home, judges and magistrates are issuing judgments and rulings that are then published weekly in the Judiciary, Kenya Law Review, and Law Society of Kenya websites. The council further directed that judgements be delivered through video conferencing technology and restricted some hearing to open spaces with the courts in cases where the public are in attendance.
