Parliament stays open late to await Budget estimates

Parliament was on Tuesday evening waiting to receive Budget estimates for the next financial year before the Majority Leader tables the figures in the National Assembly on Thursday.

With the deadline for submission being midnight on Tuesday night, the Speaker of the National Assembly, Mr Justin Muturi, opened the way for the submission of the estimates by ruling that even President Kenyatta could take them to the National Assembly.

The Constitution and the Public Finance Management Act state that the Budget has to be submitted to the National Assembly by April 30, at least two months to the end of the financial year.

With the names of the Cabinet nominees only arriving in Parliament on Tuesday, and their vetting set to start on May 8, there is no way the Secretary for the National Treasury would have met the deadline for submitting the estimates.

The Speaker’s ruling was prompted by an inquiry from John Mbadi (Suba, ODM) and Tom Kajwang’ (Ruaraka, ODM) who on Tuesday asked for guidance on how the House would go around the law.

Mr Muturi said the MPs ought not to worry “until the Speaker tells you that the Speaker’s office has not received the Budget estimates as required by the law.”

He then relied on an interpretation of Article 130 on the composition of the National Executive  and Article 132 (4a) on the functions of the President to state that even the President can present the Budget.

Article 130 of the Constitution states that the National Executive consists of the President, the Deputy President and the rest of the Cabinet, while 132 says the President can perform any other executive function provided for in the Constitution.

“If the President chooses that he himself or his deputy or any other member of the Executive is the one to communicate to the assembly, that will still be within the law,” Mr Muturi said.

Jubilee MPs celebrated by drumming their feet on the floor while their Cord counterparts fumed as the Speaker then created an opportunity for the Majority Leader, Mr Aden Duale, to table the estimates in the House on Thursday afternoon.

Within the law

“If you read the Standing Orders properly… it makes a distinction between the submission of the Budget Estimates and the laying of the same on the table of the House,” the Speaker said.

“Those two are different and distinct exercises and, therefore, let us wait and if anybody, at the time anything is being done you feel it is not within the law, you will have an opportunity to raise the same.”

After the estimates are tabled, the departmental committees will look into allocations for various sectors and submit reports to the Budget Committee, Mr Duale said before the session started.

The committees will have 19 days to scrutinise allocations to the ministries they oversee and will then extend this to the public during the 11 days at the end of this month when MPs will take a break.

The Budget committee will eventually produce a report recommending adjustments to the Budget and will then submit that to the House for debate and adoption.

A deadlock has already arisen over the formation of the crucial committee.

Cord is pushing to head it while Jubilee insists that going by its numerical superiority, it should be allowed to head it.

Jubilee argues that since the Standing Orders are silent on what committees ought to be headed by the Opposition, they can only rely on proportional strength to determine the leadership.

Cord also wants to chair the Public Accounts and Public Investments Committees on the basis that Jubilee MPs cannot oversee their own government.

If the issue finds its way to the floor, Speaker Justin Muturi could be asked to make his second significant ruling.

When he asked for the Speaker’s ruling on the Budget on Tuesday, Mr Mbadi laid out the context in which Mr Muturi would make his first significant ruling to unlock a crisis brought about by the Constitution and the human failure to adhere to its timeline. He said the Constitutional deadline would have to be met and that the Cabinet secretary for Finance would be the only person to submit the estimates.

Approve them

The Public Finance Management Act states that before the Budget estimates are presented to the National Assembly, the Cabinet, which is not yet in place, has to approve them.

“This is for obvious reasons that the Cabinet must own the estimates. Budget must be a Government Budget and, therefore, the Cabinet is required by the law first to endorse,” Mr Mbadi said.

He argued that given the circumstances, the Speaker would have to find a way to go around the laws and pull Kenya out of the Budget crisis it faces because of the absence of the Cabinet Secretaries.

The Suba MP is among legislators who argue that the Cabinet envisaged in law is composed of the President, the Deputy President, the Attorney General and at least 14 Cabinet secretaries.

Tom Kajwang’ (Ruaraka, ODM) said the President had delayed the nomination of the Cabinet and the blame should therefore not be on the National Assembly.

Irritated at Mr Kajwang’s assertion, Jimmy Angwenyi (Kitutu Chache North, TNA) said the petition by Cord against President Kenyatta’s election was the root cause of the delay.