AU Envoy Raila Odinga, on Wednesday, fiercely criticised the huge expenditures by legislators who travelled to the US this week.
The delegation comprised of both Speakers of the National Assembly and the Senate, MPs, MCAs, clerks and support staff.
Reports by Daily Nation revealed that it could not establish the exact cost of the trip, but there were indications it could cost taxpayers nearly Ksh100 million.
Through his spokesman, Odinga stated that he “finds no justification at all in Parliament and county assemblies sending such a huge delegation on a mission where a handful could come back with a report”.
The former Prime Minister further highlighted that the US trip was evidence that “these institutions have money they do not know what to do with, or they simply don’t care about the burden taxpayers are bearing.”
The trip comes at a time when President Uhuru Kenyatta’s administration is proposing cuts on foreign travel as part of austerity measures.
Kenya's delegation of legislators and members of staff to the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) in Nashville, Tennessee, is said to be the largest in the world.
The Commission on Revenue Allocation stipulates that the Speakers of Parliament are paid about Ksh 75,000 as a daily subsistence allowance for travel to the US, MPs pocket Ksh 65,000, and MCAs Ksh 42,600.
A round-trip business class ticket on the national carrier Kenya Airways costs about Ksh 587,000 from Nairobi to Nashville International Airport, and about Ksh 355,000 for economy class.
Kenya Airways started direct flights to New York, last year, and the delegation has to connect from there to Nashville in Tennessee.
An average hotel room in the area goes for between Ksh 15,000 and Ksh 30,000.
Most of the members of the Kenyan delegation are said to have arrived in the US last weekend and will leave next weekend.
