Senate Speaker Kenneth Lusaka yesterday suspended amendment of the maize scanda report that would have included Cabinet Secretary Joseph Kinyua and Agriculture CS Mwangi Kiunjuri.
Lusaka told senators that including the two will only be proposed once the House has debated the original report. It was tabled last year by the ad hoc maize scandal committee chaired by Uasin Gishu Senator Margarate Kamar.
“If it is desired to move the proposed amendments, which I had approved, the appropriate action will be to do so once the question in substantive motion has been proposed,” the speaker said.
Kinyua chaired the Cabinet subcommittee on food security while Kiunjuri (then Devolution CS), Henry Rotich (Treasury) and former Agriculture CS Willy Bett were members.
On Tuesday, Kamar attempted to move the amendments but was opposed by senators who said procedure had not been followed.
Kamar had wanted to substitute the names of Rotich and Bett and replace the entire membership of the subcommittee.
Unprocedural
However, her committee disagreed, saying they had only agreed that the names not be removed, but the list of those to be held responsible be extended.
“We have received minutes of what transpired during the Gazette notices and some of the most sweeping decisions this committee made,” Kamara told the House while moving the motion.
Homa Bay senator Moses Kajwang opposed the amendments, saying introducing new evidence no discussed in committee would disadvantage the two officials.
Read:
Minority leader and Siaya Senator James Orengo and Minority Whip Mutula Kilonzo Jnr said the amendments did not follow procedure.
“You are telling us to condemn people that you’ve not condemned in the report. That is an afterthought which is not borne by the report,” Orengo said.
However, Majority leader Kipchumba Murkomen defended the amendments, saying they were meant to enhance the report’s findings.
“The interest of this House is the truth. Any amendment that enhances access to the truth must be supported,” he said.
“ It is in the interest of this House to pursue not just the two people but also the ones that have been identified by the document.”
The committee recommended that the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission and the DCI trace and recover wealth unlawfully acquired in the maize scandal.
Debate on the report started yesterday. The committee concluded that the anti-graft agency and the Directorate of Criminal Investigations should “widen the scope” and bring those culpable to book.
Also Read: