Why State must come clear on oil import deal

At a time Kenyans are suffering steep food and commodity prices, caused by increased taxation and runaway cost of fuel, reports that crafty individuals have been making a kill from oil imports are very depressing.

When President William Ruto initiated the government-to-government oil importation deal in March, the aim was to ease pressure on the Kenya shilling by the dollar, which was another cause for the high cost of commodities.

This is because manufacturers were facing difficulties accessing dollars to fund the importation of capital goods, which threatened product shortages on the local market. The deal with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates allowed for the supply of petroleum products to local oil marketers on credit for nine months, with an extended period of six months.

According to the government, this meant the country was paying for oil imports in Kenya shilling, which the President then predicted would see the exchange rate coming down "in a very phenomenal way" within three months to below Sh120 or even Sh115.

More than seven months later, however, the shilling is rapidly weakening and now stands at Sh152.2 to the dollar, according to Friday's Central Bank of Kenya forex data. To critics, the arrangement, which President Ruto on Friday termed as innovative as it eliminated the need for subsidies, is not working.

The removal of oil subsidies in September last year coupled with 100 per cent increase in VAT from 8 per cent to 16 per cent is the single most cause of the woes Kenyans are grappling with.

It has led to deadly protests and efforts to address the issue at the National Dialogue Committee level are yet to materialise with the opposition blaming the Kenya Kwanza government of being intransigent.

Against this background, therefore, reports that senior government officials working with some local OMCs involvement in the arrangement crafted ways of taking advantage of the G-to-G deal to line up their pockets are nothing but shocking.

Even more shocking is that the money used in the deals was allegedly siphoned from public coffers under the guise of paying for the very oil subsidies the government scrapped. It is for this reason that we support calls that the government must come clean on how the entire arrangement is operating, including the agreements signed with the Saudi and UAE governments and those between the oil companies from both countries.

As a starting point, investigative agencies and Parliament need to probe claims that the contested Sh17 billion oil import was funded using public money.

There are those who never want a serious crisis to go to waste. This has happened before with famine and Covid-19, among others. Given the dire situation Kenyans are currently facing, this must surely never happen again.