By Mary Poni
Members of parliament under the committee for agriculture, food security and nutrition have protested against a misconduct of business done by the Speaker of the parliament Rt. Hon. Jumma Nunu Kumba.
The Deputy Chairperson of the standing specialized committee for agriculture, food security and nutrition Albino Akol Atak said that it’s not logical that parliament (MP) gives a mandate to a committee and its later taken away and given to individual members.
“I am here standing as the deputy chairperson of the committee with my chairperson Agustino Madock protesting against the act” said Akol.
The row between the committee members and the speaker ensued after the Speaker Nunu Kumba gave one MP to carry out a project that’s supposed to be done by the committee but awarded to the individual MP.
Akol cited that the Speaker’s refusal to meet the committee amounts to denial and delay of what the committee is supposed to do.
He stated that they were denied for almost four months without seeing the speaker including the deputies until now there is no respond given to the committee yet they are part of the leadership.
He said he recalled a day during a sitting when Nunu told them that her door is always open and ready to receive any member of the parliament.
“I am surprised that the launching has been set and the invitees are already invited and the program is ongoing without the concern of the committee,” he noted.
“Specifically, the regulation gives mandate to the committee to oversee the implementation of the program on food security as the members are aware that there is an international body called parliamentary caucus for food security and nutrition which has become a regional body”.
As South Sudan is part of the regional body, the parliament in May 2022 formed a committee since the alliances of food security and nutrition has an element which is mandated by the conduct of business to the committee.
“I believe by giving the go ahead to establish the alliance means that the speaker has acted on personal leadership not the office mandate that tells her to abide by the conduct of business which is mandatory” Akol stated.
“We made a committee to come up with the program and later we decided to first put the leadership in the picture before we could go ahead and in the middle, one of the members of parliament who is not a member of the committee took it upon himself to speak and wrote a letter to the speaker and he was given green light” he continued.
He slammed Speaker Nunu Kumba of giving a green light to a member who is not part of the committee saying that’s a clear misconduct of mandate given to the committee.
Akol said when they got the information as a committee, they immediately rushed to meet Nunu Kumba, unfortunately, they were totally blocked until today.
“The confusion still continues until they get an information that the person who is given the project has gone ahead organizing for launching of the establishment of the alliance without any notice from the committee” he said.