Concern over MCAs travels

A past sitting of the Kisumu County Assembly.

Questions are being raised over several foreign trips members of the Kisumu County Assembly are making after a group went on a five-day tour to Arusha, Tanzania.

The trip comes barely a few weeks after another group travelled to Rwanda on a trip that senior assembly officials defended as “budgeted for” despite protests from some MCAs.

It also comes at a time when detectives from the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) are looking into alleged misuse of public funds at the assembly in the purchase of chairs for MCAs.

Discontented MCAs claim that the trips do not produce any reports.

“Foreign trips are not bad if there is something to learn, but we are just concerned because we have never seen any reports,” said an MCA.

But it is the two last trips that are raising eyebrows. A number of MCAs and officials said the MCAs who travelled were not members of any committee.

“It is the same people who went to Rwanda who have also gone to Tanzania,” said another MCA.

Yesterday, acting assembly clerk Linet Ochieng confirmed that some MCAs had travelled to Tanzania but faulted the media for “unfair coverage of the trips”.

Ms Ochieng said the Arusha group was invited for a meeting and they are there on purpose.

“There is a budget and if a committee has allocated a lot of money for travels, then they will definitely travel,” she said.

Sunday Standard has established that another group of MCAs are set to travel to Kampala once the group that is in Tanzania travels back.

Kisumu County Assembly has been placed on the spot by a number of State watchdogs, including the Auditor General and the Controller of Budget.

In this financial year, the County Assembly has set aside some Sh97 million for travels and another Sh30 million listed under foreign travel.