President William Ruto has initiated his plan to reduce the national budget by Ksh300 billion, a promise he made in his inaugural address in Parliament.
At the Treasury docket, all heads of departments were ordered to suspend all training to cut down on expenditures.
The notice, issued in later October 2022, further suspended the training budget and allowances.
"As you are aware, during the opening of the 13th Parliament on Thursday, September 29, the President directed the Treasury to work with ministries to realise savings of Ksh300 billion in the financial year 2022/23 budget," read part of the statement.
"The purpose of this memo is to request you to inform the officers under your purview that all training was suspended and budget was frozen till further notice," it added.
Reacting to the directive, the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU), lamented that such a move was detrimental to its doctors' careers.
KMPDU bemoaned the austerity measures stating that training and development are key to improving service delivery, efficiency and effectiveness in the health sector.
The country, KMPDU stated, will not be able to protect itself against health challenges and pandemics if the training budget remains frozen.
It beseeched the government to prioritise investing in training, development and research.
Ruto while announcing the imminent cuts stated that the country cannot develop through borrowing.
“We should never borrow to finance recurrent expenditure. It is not right, prudent or sustainable. It is simply wrong. We must bring ourselves and our country to sanity,” remarked Ruto.
“To this end, I have instructed Treasury to work with Ministries to find at least Ksh.300 billion in this year’s budget so that we can remove it because the market cannot sustain the kind of borrowing we are doing as government,” he added.
