Kathiani Member of Parliament Robert Mbui has stepped up to give President William Ruto’s high-profile tax relief pledge a concrete legislative path. The MP has advanced a proposal that would strip income tax obligations from salaried workers taking home less than Sh30,000 per month. If enacted, the measure would offer meaningful financial relief to an estimated 1.5 million Kenyans who currently pay income tax at the lower end of the earnings scale.
The push traces its origins to the National Prayer Breakfast, a prominent national gathering where President Ruto signalled his readiness to lift low earners out of the income tax bracket. While the remarks were warmly received by many Kenyans at the time, they initially remained a political pledge without a clear route through Parliament. Mbui’s legislative action now gives that promise a fighting chance of becoming law.
Translating the commitment into statute, however, comes with a steep fiscal price tag. Treasury projections indicate that exempting this category of workers could create a shortfall of approximately Sh40 billion in government revenue. That figure has sat at the heart of the debate, with critics questioning how the government intends to offset lost earnings without tightening the screws on other taxpayers or cutting public services.
The proposal’s journey has not been straightforward. Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi initially excluded it from the 2026-2027 budget presentation — a move that threatened to quietly shelve Ruto’s pledge before it gained any real legislative traction. The exclusion drew sharp attention from lawmakers, and parliamentary action subsequently revived momentum. Mbadi has since walked back his earlier position, publicly affirming that “the promise made by President Ruto and myself will be implemented.”
The focal point now sits squarely with Parliament, where MPs must weigh a Sh40 billion revenue gap on one side against the lived pressures of workers who take home modest salaries and feel every deduction keenly. The debate is expected to be pointed, pitting fiscal responsibility against the government’s obligation to provide meaningful relief for Kenya’s lower-income workforce.
For the millions of Kenyans earning at the lower end of the formal economy, the outcome carries real-world consequences. A successful exemption would translate directly into a larger monthly take-home figure — making it one of the more tangible personal finance wins to come out of Kenya’s tax policy discussions in recent years, and a measure that would test whether a presidential promise can survive the pressures of budget arithmetic.
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