BY HENRY WANYAMA

THE Union of Kenya Civil Servants yesterday scoffed at the government’s move to tax all public service em-ployees in Pay As You Earn to cater for recent salary awards.

The union’s secretary general Tom Odege said the move is a sign of poor man-agement in the budget mak-ing process.

Finance Minister Njeru Githae on Friday said he in-tends to raise an additional Sh5 billion in taxes from civil servants in form of PAYE.

“This means the govern-ment harmonised salaries for public employees under pressure. It also means that workers’ needs have for a

long time been ignored and that is why they are wor-ried of a wage bill increase,” Odege said.

Public service employees who used toe earn less than Sh10, 000 were not in the tax bracket but with recent salary harmonisation, they will be taxed.

PAYE is currently at 16 per cent and the proposal to raise it means that lower cadre public service employ-ees will surrender close to Sh3,000 from their basic salary in PAYE only.

Odege said since major-ity of civil servants earn between Sh29, 000 to Sh40, 000, they stand to lose be-tween Sh9,000 to Sh10, 000 considering the suggested PAYE increment which could be Sh1,000.

Lowest paid teachers will now earn Sh19, 000 from Sh13, 750 and might end up earning Sh17, 000 if the PAYE increment is effected.

Workers will not accept if this is what a salary award means, giving with the right hand and taking it back with the left hand, Odege said.

He said that they expect to receive guidelines on how a new proposed increment in PAYE will affect public service employees.

It remains to be seen how the giant Kenya National Union of Teachers would react. Efforts to get a com-ment from either Knut or Kuppet yesterday did not bear fruit.

But Kenya Union of Spe-cial Needs Teachers, James Torome said it means teach-

ers went on to strike for nothing. “The government should raise funds from oth-er sources away from taxing teachers,” Torome said.

In announcing the new tax measures, Githae out-lined how he intends to raise Sh25.5 billion to pay wage awards for teachers, lectur-ers and health workers.

In total, the government requires Sh40 billion to ca-ter for additional expendi-tures pressures related to the public sector wage demands alongside security interven-tions in Somalia and the implementation of the con-stitution.

Githae said Sh1.5 billion allocated to KRA is expect-ed to boost the taxman’s capacity in tax collection enforcement.

36 LOCAL THE STAr Monday, October 8, 2012

BY PETER KIRAGU

THE International Monetary Fund is this month expected to release close to Sh9.4 billion ($110 million) to the government as the final tranche of a three-year loan programme agreed on in January 2011.

“IMF executive board consideration of the fourth programme review under the ECF (extended credit facil-ity) arrangement is tenta-

tively scheduled for October 2012,” a statement released by the fund late last month said.

“Upon approval the IMF would disburse the fourth tranche of the loan for an amount of about Sh9.35 bil-lion ($110 million), bringing total disbursement under the arrangement to SDR 344.67 million (about $535 million).”

The executive board originally approved Kenya’s

three-year ECF arrange-ment in January 2011 in an amount equivalent to Sh42.9 billion (about $505 million), and in December 2011 ap-proved an increase in access to an amount equivalent to close Sh62.2 billion.

An IMF mission visited Nairobi from September 12-25, 2012 to carry out the fourth review under the three-year ECF arrangement and expressed satisfaction with most of the achieve-

ments by the government. The members of the mission met with Finance Minister Robinson Githae, Central Bank governor Professor Njuguna Ndung’u and other senior government officials as well as representatives of the private sector, civil society and development partners.

“Looking ahead, economic prospects for 2012 and 2013 remain favorable,” a state-ment from the IMF said.

IMF to release Sh9.4bn to Kenya this month

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Civil servants scoff at Treasury over PAYE

Can you outsmart the expert?

ALY KHAN’S STAr

POrTFOLIO

A debate broke out on Forbes and the Wall Street Journal over the last week about whether Twitter was an appropriate platform for a CEO. David Shaywitz on Forbes essentially pooh poohed the idea saying a CEO needed organisational and execution skills and that Twitter was a distraction with potentially perilous regu-latory and viral risks.

This weekend I was at a Patrick Quarcoo Radio Africa symposium called ‘2020 The Future of Advertising and Media’ and @BobCollymore Esquire made a compelling presentation about his experience on social media. Bob has just under 80,000 followers, @Safaricomltd is just a few thousand behind. These are big numbers. Bob was an early adopter. @Airtel_Ke has about 2,000. The difference is about 4000%. When it comes to share of voice, Airtel simply do not have a voice.

In many respects, Kenya is a media laboratory. In Africa, the volume of Tweets is second only to South AfrIca. We are already slap bang in the middle of a new normal. King Kanute was infamous for fighting the tide and he did not manage to stop it. Our population skew means, the bulge of consumers and customers are un-der 30. Increasingly, these folks are surfing the c21st via their phones. If the CEO is not engaging, I believe he or she is missing a unique opportunity. It’s the equivalent of deciding not to be on Email.

You are missing the chance to crowd source intel-ligence, you are missing the chance to shape the mes-sage. You are allowing the crowd to shape the percep-tion of your brand.

Now this engagement carries plenty of risks. There are many flame throwers in the crowd. They are called trolls. The moment you put yourself out there, a troll or two might try and incite a reaction. It’s very easy to spot them. It’s very easy to track them. Twitter is a public timeline. Do not feed into it. Remember the bulge of your followers are likely to be very youthful. Stay on message. Do not feed into inappropriate conversations. Get ahead of the curve. If the business is seeing near term challenges (like when M-Pesa goes down), get ahead of it. Do not duck below the radar.

It’s time to embrace the c21st. There is simply no other option.

wAvE: In Africa, the volume of Tweets from Kenya is second only to South AfrIca.

CEO TO TWEET OR NOT TO TWEET?

mIxEd FOrTuNES: Striking teachers last month. The government has increased their wages but targets more taxes from them.