Saturday, June 03, 2006

Constituency Development Fund (CDF)

I happened to come across this article from Kenya Law Reports and had to rant about it.

The Constituency Development Fund (CDF) has raised many questions in the recent press in regards to the benefits that local communities will get from the fund. There are many supports of the fund many who are beneficiaries of the CDF. The thing that stands out about the fund is the numerous irregularities that are associated with the whole projects. The fund was setup with the noble intention of decentralization development and putting it in the hands of the affected communities.
I wish this were true about it, there are many things that have been outlined wrong about the whole fund, but the most glaring is the political implication of the fund.
The fund will setup District Project Committees comprising of MP (politician) mayors and chairmen of local authorities (politician) DC (political appointees) chairpersons of the CDF (political appointees)


did I hear this right, it is the fund that MP's will be getting money to contribute to Harrambees, ama was that just my imagination.
The fund is flawed from the whole process of enacting the law that it stands on, first it conflicts with the other already existing development laws that mandated government spending in local development authorities eg Tana river basin development authority, the Lake Victoria development authority etc., did they disband this government entities when the law was created, I do not think so, they are much alive just as much as the CDF is.
The CDF fund is going to be managed by MP's, this is the most laughable part of the CDF, since when did we put politicians in charge of money, that is like putting a wolf in sheep skin amongst the sheep,


bana Kenyan's ni nini mbaya
We are being robbed with our eyes wide open. The whole premise of the CDF is development; out it has been turned into a political tool. As outlined above it is definitely going to be used to offer kickbacks to people in good standing with the politicians.
The conflict of interest is glaring the MP's who are supposed to be the ones providing funding for the fund are also going to be the ones who disemburse the funds. The MP's are also able to select there kinship to the committee, did I hear committee, is there going to be sitting allowances to the committee members, where will the money come from, is that money from the so called development fund.
What is the fix, granted, it looks like Africa was never given leaders with integrity, so hoping that someone will come to fix the issue once we vote this guys out, not going to work. How about a fund is setup to challenge the medioc laws enacted by these incompetent lawmakers in court. That seems like a plausible approach to Kenya's situation, but who will fund the constitutional lawyers to do this, I propose that the people who care about the future of the nation give whatever they can to counter the evils that are being commited by the Mp's. Which lawyer will take up the cross of common mwanainchi to save us from this. That I leave to you my learned friends.


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