Nominated senators cry foul over fund share

NAIROBI: Senators representing special interests are up in arms over what they termed as skewed distribution of the Sh1 billion Senate kitty, accusing their elected counterparts of conspiring to deny them their equitable share.

The 20 nominated senators, accused their other 47 colleagues of a grand conspiracy to take the lion’s share of the money after they realised that the regulations guiding how the fund will be shared allocated them a paltry Sh50 million from the Sh1 billion kitty.

The regulations stipulate that senators representing special interests – the disabled, women and the youth – will share five per cent of the kitty, a paltry Sh50 million, compared to Sh920 million that will be shared by the 47 elected MPs, at 92 per cent.

One per cent of the kitty is scheduled to be spent on administration purposes, while two per cent will be used on monitoring and evaluation.

Angry senators accused the ad hoc committee that prepared the regulations of having ulterior motive of denying them the funds they require to undertake their oversight duties.

“We are seeing a conspiracy by the men who are elected to incapacitate representatives of women in this House, those representing the youth and the disabled. We will not take anything short of our fair share of that kitty,” said Senator Elizabeth Ongoro.

Senator Naisula Lesuuda said they would rather not take a cent of the kitty instead of taking an unfair allocation.

Senator Beth Mugo termed the allocation to the representatives of interest groups as discriminatory.

Senator Paul Njoroge who represents the disabled said each nominated senator would get Sh 2.5 million for oversight while their elected colleagues would control as much as Sh 26 million.

“This is unfair given that our constituencies are national and the little allocation cannot allow us to conduct effective oversight in the entire country. We actually should have got more,” he said.