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Lloyd Gumbo Harare Bureau
MEMBERS of Parliament who receive vehicles under the Parliamentary Loan Scheme will forgo their sitting allowances for the next four years as the benefits will be used to liquidate the $35,000 loan facility.At least 290 MPs who are not ministers will get brand new all-terrain vehicles under the scheme struck last week between Parliament and a local motor vehicle dealer, Croco Motors.
Under the deal, the government is expected to clear the $10 million debt in eight months while MPs were to pay back to the State for the duration of their tenure to 2018.
Although it has not been consistent in paying, the government decided to use the MPs’ sitting allowances to liquidate the loan for the next four years.
Cde Joram Gumbo, the chairperson of a sub-committee of Parliament’s Standing Orders and Rules Committee responsible for the welfare of MPs said: “It’s true that MPs will not be receiving their sitting allowances as the money will be used to liquidate their car loans.
“As you may be aware, there’re some MPs who are also owed from the Seventh Parliament and this Eighth Parliament as well because Treasury has not been paying the allowances since it came to life.
“Those outstanding allowances and future sitting allowances in the next four years will be clearing the vehicle debt. This arrangement will remove pressure from the government and the MPs.”
The arrangement will result in MPs getting just over $800 as their monthly salary and fuel coupons for travelling to and from the constituency to Harare when there is Parliamentary business.
But now that MPs would not receive sitting allowances directly, the fear is that some may then bunk Parliamentary business knowing they already have the vehicles.
“They will have to attend both committees and House sitting because if they don’t do that then the money will be taken from their salaries,” warned Cde Gumbo, who is also the Zanu-PF Chief Whip.
It’s likely that some MPs with outstanding allowances from the Seventh Parliament will liquidate the loan before their tenure lapses, meaning they would then be entitled to receive allowances at some point.
For those who have not missed a single House sitting, it means as of now they are owed by the government.
The government set a ceiling of $35,000 per vehicle with MPs who would have settled for vehicles priced beyond the figure being asked to pay the difference.
Zanu-PF legislator for Hurungwe West, Cde Temba Mliswa, recently took a swipe at the government for buying vehicles for MPs from a private company instead of capacitating a state-linked firm, Willowvale Mazda Motor Industries, which is currently closed.
derick.khumalo
Online Reporter