Governors vow to press on with referendum campaign
Council of Governors Chairman Isaac Ruto addressing the press at their Nairobi office on September 30, 2014. The governors’ call for the scrapping of the Constituency Development Fund will not endear them to MPs and many Kenyans. PHOTO | BILLY MUTAI |
What you need to know:
- Mr Ruto said the possibility that Jubilee MPs would shoot down such a piece of legislation at the slightest opportunity did not permit them to take the parliamentary route.
- Jubilee members have said holding a referendum would be an unnecessary burden to the taxpayers, offering that Parliament could meet the demands of governors if they dropped the referendum.
Governors have ruled out the option of letting Parliament enact a law on its own to increase the amount of funds allocated to counties and instead vowed to press on with the Pesa Mashinani campaign.
The development comes after a long lull that signalled a change of heart on the plebiscite after Council of Governors chairman Isaac Ruto was quoted in some dailies as saying they had shelved the push.
But in an interview with the Sunday Nation on Saturday, Mr Ruto said the possibility that Jubilee MPs would shoot down such a piece of legislation at the slightest opportunity did not permit them to take the parliamentary route.
He said government might either infiltrate the Bill to deny counties more cash or throw it out altogether.
“The challenge is that Parliament would have to initiate it themselves and the process would be subject to various amendments by the House. We cannot therefore guarantee such a route as MPs would also need to be unanimous to pass such kind of a Bill,” Mr Ruto said.
“We also know that Parliament is held at the whims of the Jubilee administration, which has openly said that it is against this move,” he said.
BURDEN TO TAXPAYERS
He also admitted that they have been toying with the idea of having Parliament champion the push, but because they did not rally enough support from the MPs, they dropped it.
Jubilee members have said holding a referendum would be an unnecessary burden to the taxpayers, offering that Parliament could meet the demands of governors if they dropped the referendum.
Mr Ruto also indicated that a number of governors had voiced strong support for such legislation, arguing that it would not lead to emotional flare-ups as have previously been witnessed between governors and the national government.
“We have not had a unanimous decision to go the parliament way,” he said.
The governor clarified that in exploring the option of having Parliament address their demands, they had not abandoned the referendum.
“The journalists confused this with an abandonment of the referendum. I said if Parliament passes the Bill, and it follows all the processes that lead to presidential assent, we would not need a referendum, and that is a matter of law, not my creation,” he said.
The governor said CoG has collected more than 500,000 signatures and by next month, they will have passed the one million mark so they can hand them over to the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission by January.
