Court throws out case seeking to halt MPs car purchase

The Constitutional Court has dismissed an  application filed by a concerned citizen that had sought to block government from giving sh150 million to each Member of Parliament (MP) to enable them purchase personal cars.

Justice Richard Buteera ruled that the petitioner Twaha Sanywa had failed to demonstrate to court how him and the general  public  will suffer irreparable damage which cannot be  atoned by any amount of money, if the said money is spent on MPs.

The  judge however noted that in future, should the same court find out that parliament wrongly paid Sh64bn  to its 427 members, it will go ahead to make an order to recover that money from these legislators.

This is so because Sanywa’s main petition challenging the same issue is still pending hearing before  a panel of five Constitutional Court judges.

Sanywa said that all hope is not lost in the dismissed temporary injunction. He said he believes there is merit in the main petition, since the court has a duty to investigate further how government  spends tax payers’ money on MPs, yet other arms like the judiciary and executive  perform their services in public vehicles.