Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Take Bill on counties to Senate, MP advised

PHOTO | FILE Mwingi central MP Joe Musyimi Mutambu.

PHOTO | FILE Mwingi central MP Joe Musyimi Mutambu.  NATION
By Nation Reporter
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The Senate is the right place to take a Bill to reduce the number of counties, an MP has been advised.
However, MPs warned Mwingi Central legislator Joe Mutambu, the originator of the idea, that cutting down the number of counties from 47 would be a long and tedious process that would require to be endorsed at a referendum.

“In my view, I don’t think it serves the interests of counties or even on the wage bill,” Ol-Joro Orok MP John Muriithi Waiganjo told the Nation. “There are more important and express ways we can deal with the wage bill without looking at the structure of counties.”
Mr Waiganjo said anything that touches on the framework of the Constitution would require public participation and must pass the test at a referendum.

APPROPRIATE WAY
The Justice and Legal Affairs Committee member said the more appropriate way to deal with the wage bill would be reduction of constituencies and seats in Parliament.
Mr Mutambu has told reporters that he also plans to reduce the number of Members of National Assembly from 349, while a reduction of counties would effectively reduce number of senators and governors.

Although Mr Mutambu has not yet produced a draft of his Bill, a majority of the Senators and Members of the National Assembly have stated they would oppose it.
Majority Leader Aden Duale advised the MP to “have a good look at the Constitution” and if he is serious, to give the Bill to the Senate, but warned it would not be easy.
Ugunja MP Opiyo Wandayi (ODM) said the Bill was “totally ill-advised and retrogressive.

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