SPEAKERS of county assembly earn a gross salary of Sh537,003 per month.
This is beside many other benefits, including a Sh20 million mortgage and a fat medical cover.
This effectively means that they are not only among the best remunerated in government but also top-tier earners in the country.
Indeed, research has shown that only three per cent of Kenyans earn an income above Sh50,000 a month.
Despite their colossal earnings, the speakers of county assemblies are in court asking for more entitlements, to be bankrolled by the already overburdened taxpayer.
The speakers are demanding, among other things, Sh5 million car reimbursement and mileage allowances.
The mileage allowance, they demand, should be backdated to August 9 when they were elected.
That’s not all. They want their cars maintained at Sh200,000 per month.
These demands are outrageous and reek of nothing but greed.
They simply show how insensitive the Kenyan political elite has become.
In a struggling economy where many households live below a dollar per day, why should a few people demand so much? What did Kenyan leaders learn from the Gen Z protests?
The civil service is not a place to look for riches, it is a place for service provision.
Those who desire to become tycoons through public coffers should be advised pronto to go into private practice.
The Kenyan public will resist attempts to have their taxes go to the pockets of a gluttonous few.
Quote of the day
“When you’ve robbed a man of everything, he’s no longer in your power—he’s free again.” — Russian novelist and historian Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was deported from the Soviet Union to Frankfurt and stripped of his Soviet citizenship on February 13, 1974