By Dr. Oduwo Noah Akala (M. B. Ch. B.)
There is a prevailing clamor in the national discourse regarding the
issue of salaries. This is not only for Members of Parliament but for
Civil Servants in general. The Sarah Serem-led Salaries Review
Commission (SRC) had recommended the reduction in the amount of MPs
salaries. This drew support and condemnation in equal measure. Francis
Atwoli, the Secretary General of the
Central Organization of Trade Unions (COTU) came out in strong support
of the MPs even going as far as threatening legal action against the
SRC. However, the prevailing public mood appears to be in favor of the
Serem Commission with social activists such as Boniface Mwangi
orchestrating the much talked about "Pig Protest" against what they
termed the MPs' unbridled greed.
In my view, this matter can be
settled by a keen examination of the roles and responsibilities of a
Member of Parliament by law vis-a-vis the expectations of the electorate
with regards to their representatives.
The primary role of the
Member of Parliament has always been representation. The goal of such
representation is to influence the political process in favor of their
constituency. This means that if I am a slum resident in one of
Nairobi's sprawling 88 settlements then it is my MP's role to make known
my plight in terms of water scarcity, insecurity, poor infrastructure,
lack of healthcare facilities, illiteracy, etc to the Executive
Government. It is then the Executive Government's role to address these
issues appropriately. It is this arm of Government that collects tax and
as such, it is they who bear the responsibility of putting it to good
use.
This brings to light the ludicrous nature of former
President Daniel Moi's assertions that such and such an MP is
responsible for the roads in their constituency remaining untarmacked.
Members of Parliament have never collected tax. They cannot then be
expected to play the role of the Roads Ministry. By the very fact that
the President at the time knew of the said untarmacked road proves that
the MP was doing his job. This confusion of roles was a popular
political gimmick used at the height of the KANU era to disenfranchise
opposition leaders from their support base and sadly, it has continued
to date.
The political system in the African set up has been
skewed resulting in a gross misconception among the electorate as to
what to expect from their MPs (who form the Legislative arm of
Government) versus what to expect from the Executive. I put it to you
that the Executive constitutes the implementors of Government policy and
as such bear primary responsibility for building roads, equipping
hospitals, empowering women through education, training teachers and all
other matters pertaining to public interest that you can think of. It
is the MPs' role to make these issues known to Government and to exert
pressure on the Executive to fulfill their mandate to the public.
Somewhere along the way, we as Africans began to elect our
representatives based on what they did for us in terms of cash hand
outs, paying bursaries, roofing churches, etc. Basically, we chose our
leadership based on mass bribery! This was not the intention of the
founding fathers when they drew up and included representation in our
democratic constitution. We have been led to believe that the rightful
criteria for election was how much money one had at his/her disposal and
not one's ability to hold the Executive Government to task as to their
campaign pledges. In such a body politic, it is inevitable that we end
up with less than moral representation in some cases.
The end
result of this is that our Members of Parliament are viewed as Automated
Teller Machines (ATMs) and they in turn view public office as the same.
The core of my argument suggests that if we re-adjust our national
mindset as to what the National Assembly's role is as opposed to that of
the Executive Government then dare I say that reaching a mutual
compromise on the matter of salaries will be much simpler.
Kind regards,
No comments:
Post a Comment