Nairobi — Members of Parliament have threatened to boycott house business if the National Treasury will not disburse the National Government Constituency Development Funds.
Minority Leader Opiyo Wandayi said he will move a motion for MPs to refrain from any business until the NG-CDF is disbursed.
Wandayi recalled the second quarter of the financial year when there was no single disbursement made to the constituencies.
“If this house adjourns without a clear indication of when these funds will be disbursed, we stand the risk of going all the way up to the last quarter of the last financial year,” he stated.
“I dare say and this is not an empty threat, failure to do that I will be moving the MPs to refrain from talks of recess or any business until the money hits our counties,” Wandayi said.
Majority Leader Kimani Ichung’wa told MPs that he will be engaging the National Treasury CS Njuguna Ndungu on the matter while he pleaded with the lawmakers to constitute the NG-CDF committees to alleviate it being used an excuse to delay the disbursement.
“There is nobody in the executive who should imagine that you are doing any MP a favour by disbursing NG-CDF, the funds go directly to the people, our people are not waiting for us to go on recess, they want us to go and process their bursaries for term one school fees” Ichung’wa said.
Speaker Moses Wetangula directed Ichung’wa and Budget and Appropriation Committee Chair Ndindi Nyoro to engage the Treasury CS and issue a statement before the House on 15th November 2022.
Former Treasury Cabinet Secretary Ukur Yatani had announced that funds will not be disbursed to the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) after it was declared illegal by the Supreme Court.
The CDF, in an elaborate explanation by Chief Justice Martha Koome, was declared null and void because the kitty offends the division of functions between national and county governments.
Even as the disbursement of the funds are delayed ,Members of Parliament had begun the quest to reinforce the National Government Constituency Development fund in the constitution.
In the myriad of reactions elicited before the house during the debate, the lawmakers asserted that the fund should be entrenched in the law as it has proved to be effective in transforming constituencies.
The bill co-sponsored by Matungulu Member of Parliament Stephen Mule and his Gichungu counterpart Robert Gichumu is pushing for the reestablishment of the Fund and its anchoring in law to avert disruptions on technicalities of the law.
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In the Constitution Amendment Bill 2022, the duo are also seeking the establishment of the National Government Affirmative Fund, Senate Oversight Fund and Economic Stimulus and Empowerment Fund.
“Our aim is that these funds are protected in the constitution from this year until the time God will allow us on this planet. This is a journey we are not relenting whatever comes. This is a journey we will walk as members from both sides of the divide so that we safeguard this idea to the end,” said Mule.
Wandayi supported the bill saying it will manage to cure the hurdles concerning the CDF act over the principles on separation of power between the Legislature and the Executive.
“Anybody coming to make NG-CDF non-operational is an enemy of the people. This house must choose to be on right side of the people. This back and forth on the judiciary should be brought to an end by entrenching NG-CDF in the constitution,” he said.
Ruaraka MP TJ Kajwang however advised the proposers of the amendment to bring four separate bills on the four funds that they seek to entrench in the constitution.
Kajwang mentioned that failure to present four separate bills before the house might sabotage the bill.
“This bill is so important for us to waste, you will need a caucus to advise you while drafting the bill. We don’t want anything that will poison CDF,like what happened in BBI.BBI was killed because they put too much poison,” he stated
“I suggest that every bill should go on its own,so that we have four separate bill. So that nothing poison the other, we don’t want anything to spoil the broth that we will make,”he added.
