By Mary Mwendwa
Hon. Sen Godfrey Atieno Osotsi, member of Parliament is the current Senator for Vihiga County and the Chairperson of the County Public Investments and Special Funds Committee at Parliament of Kenya, at the Senate. He is also a member of the Information, Communication, and Technology Committee. He joined Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) after defecting from African National Congress (ANC). ODM belongs to the current coalition of Azimio la Umoja–One Kenya Coalition Party, popularly referred to as Azimio la Umoja which is headed by Hon. Raila Amolo Odinga.
Who is Hon. Godfrey Atieno Osotsi
Hon Osotsi is a Kenyan-born, Current Vihiga senator. I come from a village called Emusenjeli in Vihiga County. I am a father of 4 girls.
Tell us more about your educational background
I am an IT expert with a Bachelors’s in Computer science from Egerton University and with master’s from the University of Nairobi and Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology(JKUAT) universities respectively. I am a practicing IT professional, a farmer, and a politician.
What is your role as a senator for Vihiga County
The senators’ role is clearly defined in the constitution of Kenya. Senators exist to protect devolution and the interests of the Counties. There are two important issues here, equitable allocation of revenue, where senators play a critical role, and oversight of Counties where we check whether governors and their teams are accountable in terms of the resources of the counties. We also work on legislations, motions, statements/petitions, and follow up on matters like the County integrated development plan.
We have been having a challenge in the health sector especially around service delivery and delay in salaries, what is the issue here
The problem of health is a main challenge in the Counties, health is a devolved function, but the national government still wants to control it. So we have a scenario where many critical functions are still held at the national level. Some of the functions are not fully devolved and therefore creating an imbalance in the sector. This is further worsened by the government’s attitude towards Counties, in terms of the disbursement of funds. If Counties were to buy drugs, for example, there would be no more and also you find there is a delay in salaries. We want the government to ensure that health is fully devolved as provided for in the constitution.
Secondly, we need the government to adhere to the constitution and at least set aside 15 percent of recently audited funds to go to the Counties. They collect money but the priority is to pay foreign and public debts. After paying all these they need to share with Counties but it is not happening.
Counties are suffering and it is critical to have a health Commission that will handle matters of health and deal with the disconnect between the national government and County Counties.
Without a health Commission, we will continue having these challenges in the health sector.
Similarly, some functions e.g. in Agriculture are still held by the national government. We want a scenario where full functions of devolution are devolved.
What about public finance
The treasury is supposed to be independent of the national government in managing public finance. But you see treasury is acting o the winds of the national government and as a result Counties are affected. It is the treasury that decides when to send money to Counties and how much. Now, we have a problem, I can go on and on, but we recently had a summit and agreed that within 6 months all County functions will be fully devolved. I hope it works.
About Azimio la Umoja Coalition where you belong, tell us more about the bipartisan talks that your team is pushing for
Bipartisan talks must be bipartisan as we have demanded. We suspended the demos to engage in an inclusive dialogue where stakeholders like the church, women, unions, etc will be included. We feel this is important because as Azimio we went to the people through barazas. Also, article 1 of the constitution says that the people are supreme, Direct power is given to the people of Kenya through the constitution. We, therefore, need a fusion of public interest in it. Because history has shown that any national concern in this county has succeeded when people are involved. We saw the push for multiparty democracy, it was not a parliamentary process, it was driven by the people and parliament.
when we wanted a new constitution, we went to Bomas of Kenya for the people to air their views. They were then brought to parliament.
Similarly, when we had a problem with the Post-election violence, we had the Serena talks which were also brought to parliament. So, we are saying we need the people to e involved. We cannot trust the parliament alone as currently constituted. Because one of the things Kenya Kwanza Coalition has done is to buy some of our members so that they get the numbers. As per the election results Azimio la Umoja was supposed to have the majority in the assembly, but they dismantled the numbers using money and other incentives. We are saying we recognize the parliament, but let the parliament work with the people.
Another issue is that we have two speakers in parliament who are party leaders. I have never seen anywhere where speakers are party leaders.
You say that the constitution has been breached, as Azimio la Umoja what is your take on this
Parliament is for the people of Kenya. Azimio has listed down the issue of democracy and it’s being respected. If dialogue works we must address this issue. There must be some ethics so that we don’t go to parliament against the people’s wishes. Today it may be Aximio and tomorrow it may be the other side. I think this is one of the outcomes we expect from the talks.
On the issue of buying members in parliament, do you have proof as a coalition
Buying of members in parliament can be done in different ways. In our case, we have heard members saying that they have joined the government side because of the development for their people which they have been promised. This kind of statement clearly shows that there there is a deal. We have also seen changes in lifestyles. So we have every reason to say that those who joined the other side were attracted to something.
We have given our preconditions on lower prices of flour to ksh 100, fuel to go down, and also education and generally the cost of living to be lowered.
There is also the issue of Iebc where we say that we need to handle the most urgent issue of the cost of living. We have other issues around fertilizers, the Saudi Arabia oil deal among many others that we feel were not done in a transparent manner.
We feel that Kenya Kwanza is not committed to lowering the cost of living and we need these issues to be brought to the table.
About the opening of Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) Servers, why do you need the servers to be opened and made public
The law of access to information is very clear, we want to know what is there, I do not see any problem with making the server open to the public. Locking means there is something that is being hidden.
On press freedom, we have seen some journalists being targeted during demos, what’s your take
Press freedom is becoming a serious issue currently, we have seen journalists being targeted. Threats to shut live coverage of some events like the demos. We have also seen an attempt to amend the Media Act, this is a drawback to media freedom in Kenya.
Parting shot
Kenyans need to stand with the side that is addressing their rights and fighting against the injustices they are experiencing. Eg. Corruption, election injustices, tribalism, and division utterances among others.
