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Finance Minister Situmbeko Musokotwane presented a K284.8 billion 2027 budget to Parliament on Friday. Domestic revenue is expected to pay for K233.7 billion of it, and K67.6 billion is set aside for debt service.
Finance and National Planning Minister Situmbeko Musokotwane presented a K284.8 billion budget for 2027 to Parliament on Friday 6 November. The Daily Mail, the Times of Zambia and Mwebantu all report the same headline numbers.
The budget is equal to 28.4 percent of gross domestic product. Domestic revenue is expected to pay for K233.7 billion of it, or 82.1 percent. Borrowing from home and abroad is planned at K41.9 billion, or 14.7 percent, and grants from cooperating partners at K9.2 billion, or 3.2 percent. The theme is “Grow Zambia: from stabilisation to unlocking opportunities, creating jobs and improving livelihoods for all”.
The minister stressed the move towards self-reliance. He said domestic revenue as a share of the budget rose from 58.7 percent in 2021 to 76 percent in 2024 and is projected to reach 82.1 percent in 2027. “There are no donors to pay, we must pay ourselves,” the Daily Mail quotes him as saying.
On spending, the Times of Zambia reports that K90.5 billion, or 31.8 percent of the budget, is set aside for general public services. Of that, K67.6 billion is for debt service, made up of K50.8 billion for domestic debt and K16.8 billion for external debt.
Government expects its new revenue measures to raise an additional K10.8 billion, according to the Daily Mail. Mwebantu reports the minister proposed raising the withholding tax on dividends paid by mining companies from zero to 15 percent. The Daily Mail lists changes meant to support local industry, including a rise in customs duty on imported ceramic tiles from 25 percent to 40 percent and a higher selected goods sales tax on imported meat products, from 20 percent to 30 percent. Our report of 7 November covers the tax measures in more detail.
These figures are proposals presented to Parliament, and the details of individual allocations will be reported as they emerge.
The budget sets how much the government plans to spend, how much it will raise at home and how much it must borrow. A rising share of domestic financing and a large debt service bill both shape what is left for services and investment.
All three reports rely on the minister's budget speech and we did not open the speech text itself. We did not check the figures against the Ministry of Finance documents. Allocations for individual sectors other than public services are not covered here.
Each link goes to the specific article or document we used. Two articles carrying the same wire report count as one source.
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