Speaker, MPs in Namibia Parliament benchmark visit

MBABANE – Members of Parliament (MPs) Marwick Khumalo and Lorraine Nxumalo, who are led by the Speaker, Petros Mavimbela, are on a two-day benchmarking visit to the Namibian Parliament.

According to the Namibian news outlet, the New Era Live, the visit is intended to share practices between the two Legislatures to improve performance. Khumalo is the MP for Lobamba Lomdzala while Nxumalo is Lubombo Regional MP.

The Namibian Parliament Building, also known as Tintenpalast (German for Ink Palace), is the seat of both houses of Parliament (the National Council and the National

Assembly). It is located in the Namibian capital of Windhoek.

During one of their meetings, Khumalo, who chairs the committee on standing orders and the committee on finance, noted that Eswatini Parliament was reviewing its standing orders.

Speaker of the National Assembly in Namibia, Peter Katjavivi noted during a courtesy call by the Eswatini lawmakers that exchange visits were vital in improving the capacity of both MP and staff.

Reviewing

He informed the MPs that the Namibian Parliament was also in the process of reviewing both its internal structures and its standing rules and orders in its quest to improve performance. “We have been reviewing our structures through our adopted agenda for change strategy in order to optimally provide the necessary parliamentary services.

Currently, we have a limited number of researchers and we are still subjected to the Public Service Commission and this has to change. “We have started with small steps of trying to delink Parliament from the commission.

“We have also established a budget committee to help Parliament have adequate financial resources needed for its operations. We are also currently revising our standing rules and orders. These are experiences we can share and see how best we can learn from each other,” said Katjavivi.

The MPs further met their counterparts in the committee on public accounts.