Questions as Ruto's advisors earn Ksh.1M salaries, equal to Cabinet Secretaries

It has emerged that some of President William Ruto’s advisors are on the same pay grade as Cabinet Secretaries and Principal Secretaries, earning at least Ksh.1 million per month in salaries.

Appearing before the National Assembly’s Administration and Internal Security committee, State House Comptroller Katoo Ole Metito defended the spending on advisors, saying they had helped the President to make sound policy decisions on, among other things, the reduction in the cost of living. 

"The ballooning number of advisors, so many, it is good to shed light to this committee on how much each advisor is paid," Mt. Elgon MP Fred Kapondi stated.

"The range is that some are at the level of a Cabinet Secretary, others a Principal Secretary…” Metito noted.

A CS is paid a basic salary of Ksh.594,000, with allowances including housing, medical, and transport, pushing the number to over Ksh.1 million a month.

A PS, on the other hand, is paid a basic salary of Ksh.491,906, with the allowances also pushing the payslip near the Ksh.1 million mark.

The employees on job groups T, U and V earn in upwards of Ksh.170,000. Ole Metito explained the disparities in the salaries paid out to the team.

"Advisors also come in different job groups and are decided on which job group they come in and are decided on their expertise," Metito stated.

Questions have also arisen as to the need for the advisors, some whom are rejects from Cabinet, with their roles often overlapping.

"We had an exchange rate of 162, we are now at 129, the price of local food stuffs, and all those policies being enacted emanate from these policy advisors and the research they do," Metito highlighted. 

Parliamentary records have shown that the cost of onboarding the advisors gobbles up over Ksh.1 billion annually, with the cost rising with the addition of advisors.

Although the courts slammed brakes on the Chief Administrative Secretary position, pundits have argued the President has replaced them with advisors.

This as the budget of senior government officials including retired President Uhuru Kenyatta, former Prime Minister Raila Odinga, former Vice Presidents Kalonzo Musyoka and Moody Awori suffered significant budget cuts.

Kenyatta’s office, which was hard hit, will lose Ksh.94.6 million from his Ksh.300-million allocation in the budgetary allocation for the next financial year.