President William Ruto has said he is going to implement the Housing levy no matter what it takes.
Ruto said he is certain and determined in making sure he goes ahead with the plan since implementation has been the main issue.
He further said that if certain countries were able to carry out and implement the plan then Kenya too could.
He was speaking on Wednesday during the official opening of the second annual Kenya Diaspora Investment Conference at Kenyatta International Convention Centre (KICC).
“I am telling you this time round I am implementing it and I am so determined because we must do it. Korea did it, Singapore, Malaysia and that is why they are ahead of us,” he said.
President Ruto said the same project as in the Kenya Kwanza manifesto was part of Azimio la Umoja’s manifesto.
“This beautiful project was in the manifesto of Kenya Kwanza. The same housing project, complete with percentages of the levy was also in the Azimio manifesto,” he noted.
The head of state however said that implementation of the Housing Levy was where the issue was.
He said what to be done is visible but Kenyans lack the courage to do it.
“But when it came to implementation, that is where the devil lives. Nobody wanted it implemented. We all want to talk about it, it is good, telling the people what is to be done and not,” Ruto said.
“We know what we must do but cannot gather the courage to do it. This time round whatever it takes we will implement it.”
President William Ruto’s administration has been making drastic legal proposals to anchor his ambitious affordable housing by sealing loopholes that saw the Housing Levy outlawed.
The proposals are expanded to also widen the tax net by ensuring that both the salaried and Kenyans working in the informal sector and ordinary folks pay the Housing Levy even at the point of making purchases.
The High Court however stopped the Housing Levy with findings that the tax was discriminating against other Kenyans, not on payslips.
The there-judge bench termed the levy discriminatory as it targets only Kenyans employed while excluding those in the informal sector.
“In the absence of a rational explanation for how the housing levy was enacted, we can only conclude that the respondents took the easy path of least resistance because collecting taxes from employees in formal employment is easier,” the judges ruled.
Source: The Star