Parliaments urged to adapt to new technologies

Executive Director of Mzalendo Trust, a leading Parliamentary Monitoring Organization in Kenya, Caroline Gaita, has tasked parliaments across the world and particularly in Africa to adopt new and improved technological means to ensure that their activities are not ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic as the world races to find a solution to the global canker. She noted that some parliaments have had to either suspend sittings or go on unplanned recess in a bid to comply with the safety protocols laid down by the World Health Organization, a situation which could have been handled better with appropriate technology.

This, she said does not augur well for the progress of work of parliaments especially in a serious pandemic where laws and legislative instruments have to be proved to safeguard the health of citizens.

Madam Gaita, who was speaking in a virtual forum organized by her outfit and the Parliamentary Network Africa (PN Africa) from Ghana, with support from the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy on Wednesday, September 15 2020, also intimated that there must be a deliberate effort by parliaments to strengthen their presence both in the mainstream media and social media to give the public a chance to engage and interact with them. “I think going forward, across the continent, for those that have not, it is very important that the strengthening of media presence is invested in, including live coverage,” she said.

The Mzalendo Trust boss also urged parliaments to make some modifications in their physical infrastructure in readiness for any future occurrences of a similar nature which will not bring about distractions in their work. She said parliaments should consider designing alternatives to accommodate eventualities that call for physical distancing.

She also urged parliaments to invest in the capacity building of both members of the house and parliamentary service workers in ensuring that they adapt to the new technological needs.  Madam Gaita noted that a boost in technology literacy would be key if the undertaking of parliamentary business virtually is to safeguard the integrity of parliamentary proceedings.

According to her, “Investment in innovation should be mainstreamed in parliamentary operations. And budgetary allocation should be made towards enhancing the capacity of the Parliament to undertake research aimed at developing relevant innovations key in sustaining parliamentary operations”.

Madam Caroline Gaita also called for different parliaments to copy best practices from each other in a bid to network all the parliaments across the globe. She also noted that “the objective would be to allow for peer learning and in the process allow identification and subsequent adoption of the latest measures vital in boosting uninterrupted parliamentary operations”.

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Parliamentary Monitoring Organizations were also entreated to leverage on the advantages of technology to entrench Parliamentary transparency and accountability as they continued to provide the link between Parliaments and Citizens, by facilitating citizen engagement in legislative processes.

For his part, Executive Director of PN Africa, Sammy Obeng who moderated the event, noted that it is imperative for PMOs, Civil Society Organizations that are monitoring Parliaments to make a conscious effort to engage with Parliaments in the performance of their three traditional roles such as legislation, oversight and representation, since these roles have featured strongly in these times of COVID-19. “I always say that, if Parliament or the Legislative Assembly of every country is expected to have an oversight role of the Executive branch, then the role that PMOs play is that role of watching the watchman. Because, if Parliaments play the role of the watchman over the Executive branch, then we as PMOs have that added responsibility in answering the question, ‘who watches the watchman’. These three roles have come in strong because many laws have been passed over the months to regulate matters relating to COVID-19 emergency laws, health related laws, laws to manage the movement of people in the difficult periods of lockdowns among others,” he said.

Taking her turn to address participants, Programmes Manager of the Netherland Institute for Multi-Party Democracy, Femke Lee underscored the need for stronger advocacy and engagement around open governance and issues of access to information. She said it is important to build peoples trust in the political institutions as well as to protect their human rights. “I think one of the first things we came about was around trust and human rights in this country. Trust of course is a very complex phenomenon and trust in political institutions of course refers to, citizens’ relative confidence that governments are capable, they are reliable, they are impartial and they are efficient. And during this Corona Virus era, this trust was really tested around the world including my country,” she observed.

She also charged PMOs to constantly engage with the Parliamentary system to identify the real issues which concern the people since in the Netherlands, it took quite a while for the opposition parties to start picking up the arguments on the critical issues that needed to be addressed.  “It was the public debates rather that asked far more critical questions than the opposition parties. And that took a while and I think that also shows that there is a critical role to play by Civil Society Organization and also for Parliamentary Monitoring Organizations in order to keep asking and raising those questions,” she indicated.

The forum was in commemoration of World democracy Day and had over 40 Parliamentary Monitoring Organizations (PMOs) and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in Africa in attendance. It was on the theme: Parliaments and Pandemics: Which Way Forward for Parliamentary Monitoring Organizations (PMOs)?

BY: EMMANUELLA DADUGBLOR || PNA