KENYANS ACCEPT PRESIDENT’S PROPOSAL TO HALVE FUEL VAT

A KENYAN parliamentary committee has accepted the president’s proposal to halve an unpopular new value added tax on petroleum products to 8 percent and the whole house would vote on the proposal later, a senior parliamentary leader said yesterday.

The government faced a fuel dealers’ strike, anger among commuters and a lawsuit after transport and fuel prices jumped when the 16 percent VAT on all petroleum products entered into force on September 1. “They have agreed with the president,” house majority leader Aden Duale said.

Kenyan parliamentary business is driven by committees, which scrutinise proposals and present them to the house for debate. President Uhuru Kenyatta said last week that further delaying the tax, passed into law in 2013 but never implemented, would compromise the government’s ability to fund welfare and development programmes. – Reuters