Senate during proceedings. Senators will Thursday resume for a special
sitting to discuss the Division of Revenue Bill. FILE PHOTO | NATION
MEDIA GROUP
The Senate will sit in a special session on Thursday April 9,
2015 to debate the Division of Revenue Bill, which sets the stage for
sharing of revenue between the national and county governments.
Senate
Deputy Speaker Kembi Gitura said the session is necessary in order to
ensure the flow of funds to counties is not delayed.
He
said the bill has a constitutional timeline of April 10 and that is why
the senators must cut short their break that was to end April 27, to
discuss it.
“The bill was forwarded from the National
Assembly. I have already committed it to the Finance committee. We have
even advertised, to subject it to public participation in readiness for
debate,” Mr Gitura said.
Thereafter, the Senators will
have to pass the County Allocation of Revenue Bill which indicates the
specific amount to be allocated to each county.
The Bills have to be passed so as to guide county governments when preparing their budgets for 2015/16 financial year.
Without the adoption of the Bills, the county governments stand to miss out on their share of the national revenue.
Besides, the senators have been allocated Sh1 billion to assist them establish proper offices in the counties and recruit staff.
“We
don’t expect a tug of war over this Bill. This figure was highly
negotiated and the working relations between the two Houses of late,
unlike before, has been cordial,” the Senate Majority Leader, Prof
Kithure Kindiki said.
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