Operations at Kisumu Based Lake basin Development Authority (LBDA) have been affected by lack of quorum facing the organization’s Board of Management.
Board’s chairman Calvince Owidi said that the Board could not conduct business as expected owing to the persistent quorum hitch and asked the Cabinet Secretary for East African Community and Regional Development Adan Mohammed to appoint new members to make it fully operational.
Owidi singled out procurement as being among the key services that the authority could not carry out adding that the term of most of the Board members expired in October 2018 but they were yet to be replaced.
“We cannot perform tasks such as procurement, allow for change in Bank signatories to our key accounts which basically means that we cannot operate,” he pointed out. Last week the outgoing LBDA Acting Managing Director, Eng. Evans Atera disclosed that the organization received Kshs.100million from the national government to help in the purchase of paddy rice from farmers in the region for milling.
However, Owidi observed that most of the projects they were supposed to undertake have stalled because they could not procure the services.
He said that even the Sh4billion LBDA Kisumu Mall located at Mamboleo could not be officially commissioned because of unfinished works attributed to lack of quorum.
LBDA has lately been on the spotlight following the ongoing investigations by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) whose detectives are probing its mall project.
Late 2018, nine Board members from the organization including the immediate former MD Eng. Evans Atera were summoned to record statements to shed light on the Sh4billion mall project.
Owidi made the remarks Monday during the handing over ceremony of LBDA in which Dr. Raymond Omollo took over from Eng. Atera.
Dr. Omollo, who was appointed last Friday by CS Mohammed, promised to unify the LBDA employees and ensure they remained focused on service delivery to the taxpayers.
There have been divisions among the senior staff which delayed implementation of projects.
The ceremony was also graced by the Chief Administrative Secretary in the Ministry of East African Community and Regional Development Ken Obura who promised to push for the appointment of other members of the Board.
Currently, the LBDA Board only has eight members against the required number of at least fifteen.
Obura called for the inclusion of the seventeen counties in the LBDA strategic plan which should be aligned to the President’s Big 4 Agenda.
By Joseph Ouma
Lack of quorum frustrating service delivery at LBDA
