President Ruto remains undettered as court stops housing levy

President William Ruto suffered a blow Friday morning after the Court of Appeal declined to extend an order allowing the government to continue collecting the housing levy.

A bench of three judges ruled that public interest tilts in favour of not granting the order sought by the government.

Read: Ruto pleads with court to allow housing levy

“Public interest in our view tilts favour of in not granting the stay or the suspension sought. Public interest tilts in favour of awaiting the determination of the issues raised in the intended appeals,” Justices Lydia Achode, John Mativo and Mwaniki Gachoka said.

After the ruling, an undettered President insisted that the affordable housing plan would continue, adding that the court should have given the government time to complete creating the law to actualise the plan.

“I want to say for the avoidance of doubt we are already making the law that the court authorised that we go and make. They should have given us a chance to complete the law but we are going to complete the law and we are going to go forward with making sure we create opportunities for jobs for the young people of our country because that is what the people of Kenya want,” Mr Ruto said on Friday.

Illegal levy

The government had asked the Court of Appeal to suspend a judgment of the High Court that found the levy illegal as it targets a section of the population.

In a decision last year, three judges of the High Court ruled that the introduction of the housing levy through amendment of the Employment Act by Section 84 of the Finance Act, 2023 lacks a comprehensive legal framework in violation of Articles 10, 201, 206 and 210 of the Constitution.

Justices David Majanja, Christine Meoli and Lawrence Mugambi further stated that the imposition of the housing levy against persons in formal employment to the exclusion of other non-formal income earners to support the national housing policy is without justification, is unfair, discriminatory, and irrational.

Read: High Court suspends decision quashing Housing Levy

The appellate court has said in its ruling that the question that begs an answer is whether, in the circumstances of the case, it would be in the public interest to grant a stay whose effect is to allow a statute that has been found to be constitutionally illegal to continue being in the law books pending the hearing of an appeal.

“We do not think so. This is because should the Court hearing the appeal affirm the constitutional invalidity of the impugned laws, then all actions that will have been undertaken under the impugned sections of the law during the intervening period will be legally frail,” said the judges.

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