• National Assembly is of the view that money bills are exclusive and that Senate is in violation of the law by purporting to publish them
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The National Assembly has dismissed as political, the purported publication of the Division of Revenue Bill, 2019, by the Senate.
Members accused their counterparts of blatantly violating the Constitutional provision that money bills are generated by the National Assembly.
Budget chair Kimani Ichung’wa castigated the Senate for publishing a separate bill purporting it to be the Division of Revenue Bill, 2019.
The said document was published in the wake of disagreement between the National Assembly and Senate over the shareable revenue to be allocated to counties.
Whereas the Senate proposes Sh335 billion be allocated, the National Assembly has granted Sh316.6 billion subject to approval by the House.
The Senate yesterday passed the Bill which was on its second reading. The Bill will then be presented to the National Assembly for concurrence.
Ichung’wa said that considering Article 109 of the Constitution which says a bill may be introduced by any member of parliament, a money bill remains property of the National Assembly.
He sought guidance from Speaker Justin Muturi on how the said bill would be handled when introduced in the National Assembly for concurrence.
“How are we likely to treat this matter even when the bill is referred to this House. The only Division of Revenue Bill has been published by the National Assembly and is now subject of public participation. We should treat anything else as a piece of paper and not a bill from Parliament,” the Kikuyu MP said.
Even so, members raised reservations with the publication of the new bill saying it amounted to the National Assembly ceding its powers in the law-making function.
The argument was that the bill was subject to a mediation process maintaining that the action after its collapse should be within the law.
The matter was raised by Rarieda MP Otiende Amollo and backed by his Homa Bay Town counterpart Peter Kaluma.
The latter said it was regrettable that Parliament, being an arm of government, has resorted to solving their rows in court.
“We have one Parliament with two Houses. I am concerned that the chair of the Budget Committee has indicated that we have published another DoRB yet we had transacted and enacted the same. Don’t the provisions of Article 95 and Article 96 stipulate that matters of revenue rests with the National Assembly?”
The lawmaker added that the Constitution says the National Assembly enacts legislation while the Senate participates in lawmaking.
“This is a so serious a bill to be exposed to the court process. Are we going to wait for the verdict on a matter that has been spelled in the Constitution? In as much as these matters could be in court, there is a way we have to deal with this
Suna East MP Junet Mohammed castigated his colleagues for abusing the mediation process and instead resorting to ‘street protests’.
“I condemn the act of demonstrations. It is uncouth, unacceptable and shows lack of decorum which defeats the meaning of Parliament,” Junet said.
Muturi asked members to wait for the Senate bill to be tabled before the National Assembly can comment on it.
“We are before the court on this matter hence we may not want to delve much on it. Let the debate on the matter rest, ” the speaker said.