President William Ruto has announced that the earlier planned conversion of Junior Secondary School teachers into permanent terms is on course.
The President said on Friday that despite the fall of the Finance Bill, 2024, the government will look for ways of raising money to hire them.
The government had planned to employ 46,000 teachers who are currently in internships at a cost of Sh18.3 billion.
The fall of the bill had created a budget hole of Sh346 billion but Ruto said the government would not borrow the whole amount but Sh169 billion.
Addressing the nation from State House, Ruto said the government will rationalise its budget to accommodate the teachers as promised.
The President said that since the Finance Bill was rejected, the government has since consulted extensively to strike a middle ground between borrowing money and striking austerity measures.
"We will be proposing budget cuts of Sh Sh 177 billion and borrow the difference," he said.
"Whatever we are going to borrow will increase the budget deficit from 3.3 per cent to 4.6 per cent of the GDP, but still lower than last year."
The president said the money raised from both the austerity measures and the borrowing will fund critical government programmes.
"These will be used to fund some of our crucial services that the people of Kenya have asked me to protect," he said citing the hiring of JSS teachers and medical interns among others.
