 At a time of rising cost of living crisis, the Kenyan government has introduced a contentious finance bill which is receiving major opposition from several sections of the Kenyan society. What makes the bill controversial and why is it being opposed? Thousands of members of South Korea's labour unions are on the streets against a union bashing government and its repressive crackdown of union activities. A governor, a football player and a scandal of $77 million. We discuss the story behind Mississippi's largest corruption scandal. This is Daily Debrief, I am your host Shreya and these are the stories for the day. The government of President William Ruto in Kenya has introduced the financial bill 2023 at a time when Kenya is facing a growing debt burden and a major cost of living crisis. As the economy battles with rising inflation in recent months, Ruto had already announced his decision to scrap subsidies on fuel and maize shortly after coming to office in 2022 at the directive of the International Monetary Fund. Trade unions and left forces in Kenya are saying that the new tax and levy regimes introduced by the bill will further burden the masses. Tanupria joins us now to talk about the impact of the new bill on an already struggling economy. Hi Tanupria, thank you for being with us on the show. First off, can you start off by giving us a background of the economic conditions in Kenya in which this bill has been introduced? Yes, so the government has proposed this finance bill and it is intending to put it up for debate ahead of the national budget. So I believe by next month this will be put up in parliament and it has been introduced at a time as you said the country has been going through a major economic crisis. Inflation rates have been very high driven by food prices and at a time you know when Kenya is facing the worst drought in 40 years. So electricity prices have also gone up, meanwhile the value of the currency has fallen. So economic conditions have been very difficult and this was very visible in the protests that took place in the country in the preceding months which were called by the opposition but in reality really spoke to the public anger against the kind of economic conditions that have taken place that are present in the country. And now you have this finance bill which and some of the major provisions that are causing most concern includes this move by the government to double the value added tax on things like kerosene which are very basic goods and they are primarily used by poor households to light their homes for cooking and this is going to be a significant jump in the price of these products. Then there is also we also have this is taking place at a time when the government has already scrapped subsidies on fuel and food and this was something that President William Bruto did just days into his presidency. So you now have this additional burden in the absence of subsidies over the weekend fuel prices hit historic levels in Kenya. The price of kerosene has gone up by over 9% if I'm not mistaken LPG which is liquid petroleum gas which the government is trying to make tax exempt its price has gone up by 30% over 30% in the past year. So the very basic things that people need just the very basic material things that people need to survive their prices are going up very significantly. There are also other taxes which are causing a lot of outrage which will primarily affect the majority of poor households in the country. And you know again this is being undertaken by a government that presented itself as very proper. It promised it was going to tackle the high cost of living it was not going to raise taxes but they in fact the complete opposite has happened and there's not just in terms of taxation it is also in terms of a very strong push towards privatization. We're already seeing it quite significantly in the healthcare sector in Kenya in education. So you have this kind of squeeze being put on the majority of the country through taxation but at the same time the government is also really rolling back on its role in key basic services. So we're really seeing the further burdening of working class in poor communities in the country. Right and public sector unions they have been opposing this bill for quite some time. Protests have taken place earlier also. So what are some of the issues that these unions have highlighted? Right so one of the reasons that the government is doing this the finance bill the whole move to introduce taxes is because of a potential cash crunch. So Kenya is facing a very high debt burden and billions of dollars due on interest payments this year alone. So at the same time because these are dollar denominated payments the country is also facing a decline in its foreign reserves. So amid this cash crunch in March the government delayed paying salaries to civil servants. And at that time as well public sector unions were obviously very vocal in their opposition to this because this was also the time when you know you have you're having protests almost every week the economic conditions are quite difficult and there were also sections of workers especially at the county level who had not been paid since January. So there is also this squeeze on the wage but coming specifically to the finance bill what has caused concern for workers is this idea of a 3% mandatory deduction to go towards the housing fund. So the government is trying to sort of take 3% out of or workers will essentially have to contribute 3% of their earnings to go towards this housing fund for to access affordable housing. But even in that will be subject to a different kind of criteria not every worker might qualify. So even then you know you have this kind of a deduction taking taking place. What has also caused anger is the fact that according to unions estimations there are already other existing statutory deductions on workers take home wages. So now they say that with this additional burden 52% of the wage is going to just go towards these deductions. And whatever is left that in itself is going to be subject to that because you know when you're talking about public finance as a public sector worker you're not just earning a wage you're also a consumer you're participating in the economy. So even whatever leftover wage they have that is also going to be subject to taxation. And what the issue has also been is the fact that Kenya's constitution mandates that the government must engage with workers representatives when it's trying to introduce such changes that has not happened and unions have been very vocal about that. And these deductions are also taking place which I mentioned earlier through this alongside this push for privatization. So for instance one of the deductions is for the National Health Insurance Fund and public health activists in Kenya have been very vocal that you know the World Bank particularly is pushing to include the private sector towards the NHIF. So it's going to make health care more privatized it's going to sort of the the private sector has been reimbursed at much higher rates. So the workers wages are being squeezed they're also being denied an effective public health care system. And all of this that these revenues that the government is trying to raise is in pursuit of loans. The government is already facing a dead burden but it is planning or gearing up for further loans from the IMF from World Bank from other sources. And to do that it's trying to demonstrate its ability to raise revenue. How that revenue is being raised is the question and we see that here it's being raised off of the backs of workers and poor households in the country. If the government does go ahead with the IMF and another arrangement we can unfortunately see public services like health care and education be hit again because that has been consistent throughout IMF engagements around the world. But even if we just talk about revenue or something the Communist Party of Kenya for instance has talked about is the fact that even if you're trying to raise revenue the way that you're doing it you're not doing it through imposing an inheritance tax. You're not doing it by imposing a adequate corporate taxes. There is not really a redistributive agenda in place instead you're just really pushing down on communities who are already struggling to survive. Right thank you so much for that update Tanufriya. Nearly 40,000 labour union members including members of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions marched to the President's office this week in protest of an ongoing government crackdown that led to a trade unionist committing suicide by setting himself on fire on May 1st. Tensions between unions and the conservative Yoon Sukyul government have been building recently over alleged harassment of the unions by the authorities. We go to Anish now who has the latest details on the story. Hi Anish thanks for joining us. What's happening in South Korea? What are some of the issues that the trade unions are trying to highlight? Well one thing we need to know is that it's been nearly a year since Yoon Sukyul has been in the presidency and his administration has been marked among various other things has been marked by you know very strong repression of trade union movement working class movements especially in general and that has created a great deal of friction. We saw that during the truck driver strike and the construction worker strike that happened last year and in many cases the Yoon government just either did not heed to any of the demands that the trade unions have been pushing forward for when it comes to contract negotiations or for that matter for getting a fair contract on fair wages and other stuff or for that matter they just completely bent against them even in initiating investigations against major trade union headquarters and their officials. Now this is definitely part of a larger act on the working class movement. Now among other things like why in South Korea is definitely among the more or has a more organized working class when it comes to trade union membership when compared to several other countries in the same category. There are issues definitely that the workers are grappling with in several cases. We're looking at high rate of unemployment, high rate of contract workers and contractualizing and casualization of workers and we also see prolonged working hours in many cases that is caused by lack of regulation in some cases that's just you know changes in labor laws that the government is trying to push in different sectors. So in all of these the workers are trying to highlight at the center of it they're trying to highlight how there is a concerted attack against trade unions because it's not just one trade union we're talking about it's like in different sectors you have different kind of investigations happening and on the other hand there is definitely an attack on workers rights as well and this is something that the protest have highlighted currently. Rightly said Anish tensions have been rising between the unions and the government in South Korea. Are we expecting to see more such collective actions in future? Yeah for sure because for one apart from the strike sorry the protest that has happened on the 16th and the 17th workers union trade union movements especially the KMWU had already announced a for our warning strike on May 31st and we can expect more coming from them and other trade unions as well. The KMWU is one of the one of those trade unions that have been under attack through different you know various kind of judicial legal instruments that the government is trying to employ against them are alleging them of you know getting foreign funding or some kind of foreign conspiracy trying to sort of use the sort of cold war arguments of them being you know secretly socialists you've seen you see that in the kind of debates and discourses that people who either support the ruling party or are from the ruling party make in different statements and so the sort of thing is going to continue if and for that definitely the workers are going to fight back we're looking at you know this is just one trade union confrontation that has over a million members full-time members across the country there are others as well and obviously they're not going to sit tight and you know or you know just not have any kind of involvement in such kind of repression happening. The fact that they're also highlighting the suicide of a trade unionist and a construction worker who self-immolated himself on the first May 1st or you know what the international workers day that we commemorate usually it also highlights the kind of desperation that workers are usually pushed to because if people like you know somebody like a construction worker is already facing rising prices higher cost of living and definitely stagnating wages over you know more than a decade in many cases and on the other hand they have to also face lawsuits that was initiated by the document which have which are very difficult to fight you know federal lawsuits are very difficult for anybody in any part of the world and even South Korea it's not going to be any different so the fact that somebody like him was pushed to that desperation that he had to self-emolate to highlight the issues that are affecting the working classes and the fact that working class movements are highlighting it shows that this is a general problem and this can also create a bigger issue and a wider class conflict in the coming days. Right thank you so much for joining us Anishin for that update. Brett Favre a former football player with the record of playing in 20 seasons of the National Football League is in news for his alleged role in what has been called the biggest corruption scandal involving public money in the state of Mississippi United States although the former quarterback has not been charged criminally a new report by Michael Rosenberg of Sports Illustrated reveals his role in the misappropriation of state funds meant for the poorest of the poor. Siddharth Ani joins us now for the latest details on the story. Hi Siddharth thanks for joining us. So what is really the involvement of Brett Favre in this case which is also being called the largest corruption scandal in the state of Mississippi. Yeah I think you absolutely right Shreya public prosecutors I've called it the biggest sort of public embezzlement of or embezzlement of public money in the history of that state reporters who have been covering the story have said that the total amount of misappropriation it's of course on an American scale right when they do things they do them big it's around 77 million US dollars so a huge huge amount of money the reason we're talking about it today is is a couple of things that have been for further indictments in this case also offer a couple of so certainly a couple of athletes are or former athletes are definitely involved I think international audiences who watch professional wrestling WWF as it used to be called WWE now I think there used to be someone called Ted DBRC the million dollar man back in the day is a wrestler from the 80s and his two sons they are also implicated in this a ministry or a church that Ted DBRC senior runs apparently received more than two million US dollars his sons have received hundreds of thousands US dollars some people are of course feeding guilty to these charges based on revelations as they are coming out several bureaucrats are implicated and actually the implications of this can go all the way up to the former governor of the state Phil Bryant and you know it's of course not hard to understand or imagine how these these guys have gone about orchestrating all of this because Phil Bryant for example is the kind of person who believes that churches should be doing much of the work that governments currently do especially in the realm of welfare providing assistance to those who need it the most helping the poorest of the poor and that's what really actually the crux of this story is that money that was meant for the there's a fund called the temporary assistance for a needy families fund which is supposed to be disbursed in the form of welfare checks and food assistance to those who really really need it now money from that fund has been appropriated to build a five million dollar volleyball venue for the University of Southern Mississippi which Brett Farve the legendary quarterback that we that you were talking about had promised to the university he belonged he went to that university they offered him a scholarship he played college football there but he didn't want to pay for it it seems and Michael Rosenberg who's a reporter at my former publication Sports Illustrated has a very long piece out I was reading it early this morning it's fascinating story it's a it's a long investigation that follows up on the work done by the likes of Anna Wolf who's a reporter with Mississippi Today has shout out to all these reporters by the way it's also the story is also great because it highlights the value of local independent journalism and asking questions to people who are in who are representatives of the public you're holding public office whether it's bureaucrats or politicians Brett Farve himself is unabashedly right wing he's a he's a Trump supporter he appeared on a podcast the other day where he's talking about how the United States was in a better place when Trump was in charge and then he's gone on to make some really unsavory statements about trans people you know and all this while he's being accused or well the investigation is on and and what Michael Rosenberg's very long piece reveals that there's enough what do we call it enough smoke in this story to indicate that there is a fire somewhere right the text messages indicate I have shown exchanges between Brett Farve and several bureaucrats as well as the governor all chasing this cash to pay for this volleyball center that he really really it seems didn't want to pay he could easily have signed a check he's a multi multi multi millionaire but he so he could have easily written a check and it would have been done and dusted but that's not how he wanted to go about it what he wanted to do was make the government pay for it somehow and they have done it in this really convoluted manner and by what it seems at least what the state is saying the public prosecutors are saying is definitely a misappropriation of of funds so so essentially the story today is that Brett Farve is not in the clear as far as this case is concerned and if further evidence or if the prosecutors feel that they have managed to uncover enough then a possibility of an indictment is also still open so that's essentially why we are talking about it today right to the hunt and for our audience could you also explain how does the welfare schemes and the social security system in the united states works and how you explained already about the yeah so I think I think what what I have learned from reporters who are sort of who work on on this state is essentially that a lot of the the wording and the the sort of language around a lot of these a lot of these welfare monies is kept deliberately vague so that states have the ability to kind of use that money for various things and and and I don't know whether this is done deliberately at the federal level in the united states to to make sure that you know things happen in a more expeditious way or that money the states can disperse funds easily to those who need it but what has ended up happening over time in several of these states and it has to be I think pointed out that several of these states are republican government that over time less money is progressively being spent on what is I suppose the most important function of this money which is providing like like the word say temporary assistance to needy families right so money from welfare checks has reduced money on food stamps food assistance has reduced instead because sort of this money can kind of be used legally for all kinds of things those in positions of power in public office have been over time using these monies for their own pet projects for example in in the same state of Mississippi money is being spent on things like encouraging work and marriage ensuring that there are less children out of wedlock you know things like this which A are I suppose very hard to gauge and B I'm not I'm not sure necessarily fall under the purview of what the state needs to be doing so if for example governor Phil or my governor Phil Bryant believes that the church should be looking at aspects of taking care of welfare needs of people then you know discuss these kind of discussions about wedlock and having children out of it also is in those in the purview of those kind of institutions and not at all the state so a lot of the money that has gone to some of these former wrestlers for example has gone for things like motivational speaking with very little to show in terms of what life-changing activity the or what life-changing motivational speaking Ted DiBiase is doing that requires millions of dollars of state money to be spent on his effort you know so so so these kind of very obvious it seems red flags are peppered all over the system and there's a great deal of reportage on it so I would I'm sure we're running out of time as well so so I would just I would really recommend to our viewers to spend the weekend you know checking out check out and I will check out Mike Rosenberg story it's a great story on on SI.com and and I think definitely it seems with this kind of information coming into public one thing is for sure that conversations around how welfare works in the US will continue and that red fabs involvement in this particular scam is not over yet. Thank you so much for that update and for that to telling us about that story Siddhan and that's all we have for today for more such stories keep watching peoplesdispatch.org you can also follow us on Instagram Twitter and Facebook