Government sued over Ruto's single paybill number directive

By Peter Ochieng

The government has been sued over president William Ruto's directive to have all public services paid using a single paybill number.

In his application, Fredrick Ogola says that president Ruto’s unilateral and arbitrary direction on the closure of all government digital payment numbers so as to allow the onboarding of all government services, national and county, into one digital payment platform is contrary to public finance management.

The paybill number is 222 222.

"The centralization of all national and county government payment into a single one is contrary to the spirit of devolution as it does not promote the distinctiveness of national and county level governments," states the petitioner. He wants the court to declare the Head of State's directive illegal.

"A declaration that the directive to on-board government services to a single Digital Payment Platform of Paybill Number 222 222 on eCitizen.go.ke as conveyed in Gazette Vol. CXXIV-No. 287 Gazette Notice No. 16008 and published on the 30th of December 2022 in the absence of a management framework is in violation of Article 201 (a) of the Constitution as read together with section 29(1) of the Public Finance."

He says if Ruto's directive is implemented, over 200 businesses will shut down leading to loss of over 74, 000 jobs across the country.

The directive takes effect on 30th September, 2023.

The High Court directed the Attorney General’s office, Treasury and Ministry of Information, Communications and Digital Economy to respond by August 29, 2023.

The matter comes up for mention on 4th September, 2023.

On 30th June, president William Ruto gave a directive that over 1,000 paybill numbers used to recieve payments for government services be shut down within 90 days.

"I am going to be making an announcement here that in the next 90 days, all other paybills must be shut down because we have a problem with some of the PayBills that we cannot account for. We have close to over 1,000 paybills some of which we don't have sight of. They must now be closed."

He said all government money be paid through 222 222 directly to the treasury, so that the treasury makes sure that that whole eco-system works.