By Joseph Johnson

The speaker of Parliament, Dr. Abass Bundu has announced that parliament will give life to Section 74(4) of the 1991 constitution which gives them the power to prescribe what they want as budgetary allocation approved by the President. 

The announcement came during a parliamentary leadership retreat and workshop on the review of the standing orders. Dr. Bundu said that they have reached a point where the leadership is getting a little bit tired of bantering with the officials of Ministry of Finance literally begging to make parliament stay alive. He cited an instance when the clerk briefed him that parliament does not have a single cent in its account to do anything, so he enquired why and all fingers were pointing at the ministry of finance. “I wonder why the ministry of fiancé will be rather lethargic, too slow to our request and yet we have a provision in the constitution that has been dormant which we are now giving little impetus to and that is section 74(4),” he said. Speaker Bundu expressed hope that this time around they will take the bull by the horn with the blessing of the President to give life to section 74(4) which states that “Members of Parliament shall be entitled to such salaries; allowances; gratuities; pensions and such other benefits as may be prescribed by Parliament.”

He revealed that he instructed the clerk of parliament not to appear before any budget session convened by the ministry of Finance. “Parliament for the first time will ensure that its own budget will be prepared, submitted for concurrence of Mr. President and given the actualization that was envisaged in the constitution and that will bring to an end the trooping to the ministry of Finance every so often with cap in hand, begging for them to give us something,” he ended.