AR’s Job Amupanda slams N$1m ‘tea and roses’ parliament budget

Affirmative Repositioning (AR) leader Job Amupanda has questioned a N$1-million National Assembly budget for flowers and refreshments, criticising the spending amid a lack of basic parliamentary stationery.

The budget was secretly allocated to the Office of the Speaker, he says.

Amupunda on Friday addressed a letter to National Assembly secretary Esther Kaapanda, in which he questioned the logic behind spending N$270 000 on flowers and N$770 000 on refreshments while members of parliament lack basic stationery.

“Who are we buying the flowers for? Are we a Valentine’s charity?

“The parliament has over the years just been a rubber stamping institution, where members just wear suits and allow things to slide. It is a theatre of incompetence and unprofessionalism.

They want to continue doing these things,” he says.

Amupanda says he has raised the matter with the “chaotic administration” of the parliament, as well as with minister of finance Ericah Shafudah.

“We will see what they will say, but we will not leave this matter. We will not allow these things to continue,” he says.

He says the allocation comes despite earlier budget discussions in which Vote 03, covering the National Assembly’s budget, was passed only after “compromises and undertakings” that further consultations would address members of parliament’s concerns.

“Although some of us were suspicious of the undertakings, we gave those making them the benefit of doubt. It is now clear that our suspicions were correct,” he says.

In his letter, Amupanda compares the N$270 000 flower budget to the N$20 000 set aside for hosting international delegations.

“How do you allocate N$270 000 for flowers and N$770 000 for cooldrinks and biscuits while parliamentarians do not have stationery in their offices?” he asks.

He demands an explanation of who approved the expenditure, as well as a full breakdown of the Vote 03 budget to be shared with all members of the parliament.

“If these things were allowed in the past, please be informed that a new generation of members of parliament has arrived opposed to the zombification of parliament and parliamentarians,” he says.

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