East African Community writing law to govern regions’ co-operative societies

East African Community member states are set to formulate a law to govern co-operative societies in the region.

And as part of this, the East Africa Legislation Assembly (EALA) is calling on the public from Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi to give their views on the East African Community Co-operatives Bill 2014, in two weeks’ time.

“The views will be forwarded to the EALA committee on Agriculture, Tourism and Natural Resources to compile a detailed report,” said Eastern Africa Farmers Federation (EAFF), a regional farmers’ lobby.

The EAFF was granted observer status in the EAC in March 2010.

Its president, Mr Philip Muchiri, on Saturday said the Bill would then go for the second and third readings in Parliament where the comments would further be interrogated to reach heads of states during the regional summit set for December.

HARMONISED LEGAL FRAMEWORK

The Bill was moved by Uganda’s EALA representative Mike Ssebalu, and aims to create a harmonised legal framework that will enable co-operative societies to exploit their potential in the region.

The federation is working with EALA and industry stakeholders to ensure the Bill becomes law before December.

Mr Muchiri said the law would give power to co-operatives to make independent trade decisions across the region without suffering from rigorous governance by individual states.

“I think there has been too much government in many co-operative societies in each of the partner states,” explained Mr Muchiri. “Currently, ministers, commissioners or registrars are allowed to dissolve a co-operative’s management team. This created a lot of interference in the movements leading to collapse of most.”

The common law will also provide a framework to facilitate co-operative business, which is highly dominated by agricultural-related activities and enterprises.