President Uhuru Kenyatta recently signed into law the Sacco Societies(Amendment) Bill.
The new law provides for the usage of ICT in collecting and receiving statutory reports. This is aimed at reducing the regulatory reporting burden on Saccos and ensuring a faster, efficient, and accurate reporting, monitoring and analysis of Saccos financial status at any time, being the cornerstone of Risk-Based Supervision.
The law also seeks to align the definition and roles of Minister to Cabinet Secretary and also the responsibility and office of the Controller of Budget as reflected in the Act, to be in line with the Constitution.
 Before receiving Presidential Assent, the Bill was republished following the Court of Appeal judgement in Civil Appeal No. E084 of 2021 which nullified the Sacco Amendment Act No. 16 of 2018 for want of participation by the Senate.
The new law allows the Sacco Societies Regulatory Authority(SASRA) to establish and operate an electronic filing system for the purposes of electronic filing of the statutory returns and documents or any other information required to be furnished to SASRA under the Act or any other written law.
If a Sacco is undercapitalized, undertakes business that is contrary to the Act or engages in any other act that is detrimental to its members and the public, this new law allows SASRA to impose financial penalties on the Sacco, or any of its directors, committee member, employee or any agent of the Society as prescribed under the law.
Clause 4 of this new law requires that SASRA shall submit its statement of income, expenditure, assets and liabilities to the Auditor General and not the Controller of Budget in the Constitution.
The new amendments of the Sacco Act provide that a person shall not be qualified for appointment as a member of the Board at SASRA if the person is a Member of Parliament, County Assembly or does not meet the requirements of Chapter Six of the Constitution.
Under the new Sacco law, SASRAÂ will now receive statutory reports from regulated Saccos, in an electronic format.
This measure is expected to enhance the capacity of SASRA to enhance its surveillance capabilities, based on a real time and risk-based supervision model.
This proposal was first published in the Finance Bill 2018, to amend the law to allow for electronic filing of reports to SASRA by all regulated Saccos.
