Siaya missed out on presidential goodies last week for lack of proper planning and cohesion among leaders made, MCAs said yesterday.
MCAs Leonard Oriaro of Central Alego and his Siaya Township counterpart Obiero Otare said grassroots leaders were locked out ahead of President Uhuru Kenyatta’s visit.
They said the leaders could not come up with a memorandum that captured areas of interest where presidential intervention would have been sought.
The two spoke during a fundraiser for Siaya Township Boda Boda Savings and Credit Cooperative Society in Ahindi Gardens, where Sh363,350 was raised.
The leaders said there are many national government projects that would have been launched had there been proper arrangements.
“During Uhuru’s first term, we had a multimillion-shilling water project and the Siaya-Rwambwa road, which have not been launched,” Oriaro said.
He said the national government is building stadiums across the country and if county leaders were organised, they would have asked Uhuru to launch the construction of Siaya stadium.
So much to be done
Oriaro said Governor Cornel Rasanga could only watch as other counties in Nyanza benefitted.
He said the President visited Bondo and later crossed over to Ugunja, bypassing the county headquarters, which lies right in the middle of the two subcounties.
The MCA said there are several issues at the county headquarters that the President’s visit and intervention would have helped resolve.
They include the moribund Barack Obama University in which the county government sunk millions, only to realise it was a national government function.
Oriaro and Otare said the Siaya assembly will not be intimidated into supporting schemes aimed at pilfering public funds. They said there is a push by the executive to have the assembly pass a supplementary budget in which more than Sh1 billion has been set aside to pay pending bills allegedly owed to contractors.
“We shall scrutinize each and every payment and demand proof that indeed the job was done before payment is made,” Oriaro said.
Otare said the assembly’s stand over the supplementary budget should not be interpreted to mean that the MCAs are undermining Rasanga’s leadership.
He said all the MCAs want is to promote the rule of law and proper use of public funds.