Crisis raises concern about MPs' competence

They were so fascinated with the marital status of the new Governor of Central Bank of Kenya, Patrick Njoroge, that MPs seemingly forgot to vet him.

Some even offered a bride to the man who is single by choice.

Here were honourable MPs more concerned with what is, in all fairness, mundane and with little bearing on the fundamental role of a CBK Governor. In the ongoing debate about the vanished Eurobond billions, the 11th Parliament is, in all surety, at fault.

For Members of Parliament epitomise what is wrong with the Kenyan body politic: a lethal cocktail of utter incompetence, duplicity, back-stabbing, mendacity and numbing opportunism. Nothing illustrates this more than the country finding itself saddled with an unsustainable debt burden. It is thanks to MPs' knack for sideshows and refusal to do the job they were elected to do. In fact, most MPs think they were elected to politic.

Just like in the Parliaments before, members of the 11th Parliament are voting machines at the beck and call of the Executive. They are prisoners of pork-barrel politics; They have taken the scratch-my-back-as-I-scratch-yours philosophy to its extreme logical end. That the MPs were not keen enough to pick out the ballooning debt is surprising. After all, what are MPs elected to do if not to protect public interest at all times?

Apparently, the MPs by design or default, did not pick out the missing Eurobond billions despite it being captured in the Controller of Budget's Budget Implementation Review Reports issued to Parliament quarterly.

In their book, Why Nations Fail, development economists Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson outline the origin of prosperity and poverty. No doubt, corruption and mismanagement stunts growth and impoverishes millions, especially in Africa.

The bottom line is this: corruption thrives because of weak institutions. The drafters of the 2010 Constitution acknowledged the fact that power, corruption and impunity were inseparable and designed a system to disperse power from the centre. It may be too early to judge if this is effective, but the tell-tale signs are already there. That things seem not to be working well is no secret.

One of those things is the interpretation of MPs' oversight role. During the vetting of Dr Njoroge, perhaps the MPs thought knowing why the incoming Governor was not married was part of the vetting. Such an incident only helped to raise concerns about their grasp of the bigger picture. In their quest to create more levels of accountability, the drafters of the 2010 Constitution thought perhaps vesting the responsibility of vetting in Parliament would serve the public good.

Alas, they were wrong. First, fearing that many of them would be locked out, members of the 10th Parliament repealed the section that placed the education requirement for MPs at Bachelor's level. Many feel, and rightly so, let down by MPs. Over time, Parliament has become what 'Why Nations Fail' refers to as an extractive institution.

In Kenya, like many developing countries, extractive institutions have hobbled development. Extractive institutions are those where leaders holding influence aim to make money and power. They peddle influence. Variously, there have been allegations of cash-for-questions, or cash-for-favourable-reports. It is no wonder then that critical legislation that would improve the lives of the people ten-fold does not find its way onto the floor of the House. Or that hardly are there any groundbreaking reports on corruption and theft of public funds despite the obvious cases of the same.

The MPs are the bane of our democracy. This was made scarier when members of the Parliamentary Accounts Committee were fingered on the infamous list of shame by the EACC. To regain its power, place and legitimacy, MPs will have to change their image.