The Majority and Minority leaders in Parliament have been accused of spearheading the shooting down of the contraband sugar report.
Kanini Kega, the chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Trade, Industry and Cooperatives, termed the rejection of the sugar report as “sad, despicable and an unfortunate incident that compromised the faith of Kenyans in their elected leaders”.
“We must regain the faith of the electorate and the first step is to investigate Mbadi and Duale so they can explain their role in the shooting down of our report,” he said.
Even as the debate on allegations that MPs were bribed to shoot down the report rages, the legislators have accused Mr Mbadi of failing to offer proper guidance to his troops.
Mr. Kega wants Majority Leader Aden Duale and Mr Mbadi probed over the rejected report. Mr Kega on Monday called on the Directorate of Criminal Investigation and the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission to investigate the MPs for allegedly receiving bribes to shoot down the report last Thursday.
“Everybody who was present at the National Assembly on Thursday will be investigated, but Mr Duale and Mr Mbadi must be the first to respond to queries,” he said. “It is shameful that an elected leader can take money to shoot down a report that cost the taxpayers millions of money. Some leaders are not setting a good example to Kenyans,” he added.
Mr Mbadi, who is serving his third term as an MP, and is one of the senior ODM legislators, is being accused by his colleagues of betraying the cause of championing the interest of farmers, mainly from Western and Nyanza regions.
Muhoroni MP James K’Oyoo said Mr Mbadi failed to provide leadership prior to the debate of the report in the floor of the House.
“He is the team leader and we expected him to marshal his troops before the debate and tell us that we were going to reject this report because of specific reasons. From there, we could have engaged him on the amendments required,” Mr K’Oyoo told a local daily
He accused his colleagues, who rejected the report, of hypocrisy, saying they had a chance to appear before the joint committee and propose the necessary amendments.
Dagoretti North MP Simba Arati said he is very embarrassed to have Mbadi as his leader in the National Assembly. “It is a shame that Mr Mbadi pioneered the downfall of the report, and he cannot be my leader anymore,” Mr Arati said.
Mr Arati, who was a member of the joint committee, said Mr Mbadi and his colleagues who castigated them for reportedly doing shoddy work, should have proposed amendments to the report instead of trashing it in its entirety.
Uriri MP Mark Nyamita said he was disappointed by the House leadership, who spearheaded the rejection of the report instead of proposing amendments.
“The fact that there are even allegations of bribery in Parliament over the report makes us to ask whether the leadership know something that we don’t know,” Mr Nyamita said.
Lugari MP Ayub Savula claimed that Mr Mbadi is a mole, hinting that he will marshal his colleagues from Ford-Kenya and Wiper to kick him out of office as the minority leader.
But speaking in Kabondo Kasipul, Mr Mbadi maintained that he will stand by what he said about the sugar report. “I will stand by what I said and still reject the report if it is brought back to the floor of the House because it was a useless report. We wanted this committee confirm if there is mercury in the sugar that we consume or not, and they failed to do that,” he said.
He claimed that the committee protected sugar barons in their report because they failed to mention those responsible for importing, and selling the illegal sugar.