What it will take to execute Raila’s social protection policy

The proposal by ODM leader Raila Odinga to provide Sh6,000 for each poor family per month so that nobody sleeps hungry has sparked a debate on how it can be implemented if he were to be elected president next year. What would need to be done for such a bold proposal to be delivered cost-effectively for the benefit of Kenyans? I will address the “how” of social protection in this discourse.

How can Kenya afford expansion of social protection? Thieves steal Sh2 billion per day from Kenyans as President Uhuru Kenyatta once admitted. Jailing these thieves is the number one source of revenue to improve services to Kenyans. Going by this estimate pilfered haul, there is Sh700 billion a year, a whole one third of our current budget, that can be generated if courts start imposing stiff jail terms for convicted thieves of State resources. The rest of the thieves will then get scared from even imagining putting their sticky fingers in the national till.