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{
    "id": 1003262,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1003262/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 346,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Tigania West, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. John Mutunga",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13495,
        "legal_name": "John Kanyuithia Mutunga",
        "slug": "john-kanyuithia-mutunga"
    },
    "content": "that there is such a provision that exempts the youths. That is why I am saying: let us tax the businesses but exempt the businesses that are owned or run by the youth of this country. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, I would like to thank the Committee for avoiding taxation on retirement benefits. Retirees have already suffered a huge blow because they are not earning the much they were earning when in employment. In this case, therefore, it is important for us to look at how we can deal with the issue of supporting them even more. If our country was rich, I believe we could create facilities for the retirees to be comfortable, so that they can enjoy their final days in this world. So, taxing their benefits would be painful. Taxing their benefits was painful. Wherever we went during our visits to our people, they asked us why we were going the way of taxing the little money that they get from the Government irrespective of how little it is and the commitments they already have. I would like to emphasise that not only do they have commitments of their own but some of them are already shouldering commitments of others who are related to them as they used to. What has changed is the scale at which they are supporting what they used to. Therefore, it is important for us to consider not taxing the retirement benefits. I would like to bring out some contradiction that comes up in terms of the ceilings that we may make vis-à-vis the taxation we are coming up with. This country heavily relies on fuel for energy. Therefore, we are taxing LPG gas. On the other hand, we have also heavily taxed the equipment or the utilities that we buy from outside the country like the biogas burners and others which use renewable energy. It, therefore, means that the adoption of renewable energy option will remain low and we will also curtail most of the users of LPG. We need to look at the gains versus the losses. We are likely to lose a lot more firewood and that means a lot more of the forest in trying to increase our forest cover to 10 per cent so that we may be in line with the international agreements. I would like to emphasise the point that voluntary disclosure of taxes is important for this country and for many people who have not been able to organise their taxes paid to the Government. Therefore, that gives us an opportunity. When it comes to Economic Processing Zones (EPZ) and what we can get from them, that had been limited to 20 per cent. Many of us may not realise the importance of this. The fact that this is recognised and increased to 50 per cent enables this country to benefit from EPZ. What is produced at EPZ mainly goes out of this country. Therefore, increasing the accessibility to 50 per cent will help us to even improve the materials, textiles, apparels and the opportunities that we have to change and focus on buying and building Kenya. In terms of public-private partnerships in infrastructure, we would like to have this as a test case because it might give us major relief in terms of financing infrastructure in future. When we have private partners establishing road or railway networks and, therefore, charging through toll stations, it will help us a lot. This comes in as a classical example of what we would probably adopt as a mechanism for developing infrastructure in this country. I support that. I would also like to support the fact that this particular Report adheres very closely to Article 201 of the Constitution as read closely with Article 114 which looks at the pros and cons in terms of consultation, openness, accountability and public participation. We were given a list of so many institutions that have submitted their memoranda so that they can participate in the budget-making process. Even as we move in that particular direction, in the spirit of participation, equity, raising resources and sharing them across the country, we need to ask ourselves how our people are. The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}