President William Ruto will make his way to Parliament buildings later this afternoon to deliver the State of the Nation Address.
The head of state made his inaugural address to parliament last year in September, 16 days after his swearing in where he outlined Kenya Kwanza’s legislative agenda for the next five years.
However, the President will return to Parliament this time to provide a progress report on the achievements of his government one year into office, in line with Article 132 (1) (c) of the Constitution.
Article 132 (1) (c) stipulates that, “Once every year, report, in address to the nation, on all the measures taken and the progress achieved in the realization of the national values, referred to in Article 10; publish in the Gazette the details of the measures and progress and submit a report for debate to the National Assembly on the progress made in fulfilling the international obligations of the Republic.”
Upon assuming office, the Kenya Kwanza government adopted the Bottom Up Economic Transformation Agenda (BETA), a plan that President Ruto seeks to utilize to implement his transformative agenda for the country.
BETA lists agricultural transformation and inclusive growth (small and medium enterprise), housing and settlement, healthcare and digital superhighway and creative industry.
To achieve the plan, the 2023/2024 budget has allocated 278.7 billion shillings for all the programmes under Beta in a bid to turn around Kenya’s economic fortunes.
President Ruto’s address comes amidst the ongoing bi-partisan talks by a committee consisting of members drawn from across the political divide.
The committee seeks to tackle several issues among them the cost of living, restructuring and reconstitution of IEBC as well as fidelity to political parties and the law on multi-party democracy.
The state of the nation address comes at a time when the government is awaiting parliamentary approval on the deployment of 1,000 police officers to Haiti for a security mission.
Other security issues of concern include the banditry menace in the Rift Valley region and the terror threats including in the Coastal County of Lamu.
To address banditry, the government has deployed a multi-agency team of security officers in the six North Rift Valley Counties, which has been on ground since February this year.
