Governors who will defy Senate summons over audit queries risk having their disbursement schedules blocked, Senate County Public Investments and Special Funds Committee Chairperson Godfrey Osotsi has warned.

The warning comes amid an escalating standoff between governors and Parliament over accountability. Governors, while speaking from Kilifi, resolved to snub the Senate committee summons, citing intimidation and extortion from some senators.

But Osotsi on Thursday, December 12, 2026, termed the move by governors to snub summons as unconstitutional and a move to escape accountability. He said it amounted to a direct challenge to Parliament’s authority over public finance.

“The work we are doing is a constitutional exercise. You cannot appropriate money without accountability. If there is no accountability, there will be no appropriations,” Senator Osotsi said during the committee sitting at Bunge Tower.

The senator dismissed claims that governors were being invited excessively and clarified that county appearances before Senate committees are not coordinated through the Council of Governors (CoG) which he described as “an amorphous body not recognised by law. Instead, he said, counties are summoned individually because funds are appropriated to them directly by Parliament.

In a firm warning, Osotsi said his committee would recommend to the Senate not to pass disbursement schedules for counties that fail to appear before oversight committees.

“They cannot want to receive money without accountability. If there is no accountability, there should be no single coin going to those counties,” he said.

He attributed the increased frequency of county appearances to strict constitutional timelines under Article 229 which requires the Senate to dispose of audit reports within three months of their tabling.

A High Court order issued last year, he said, had ended the extended timelines previously enjoyed by Parliament.

As a result, Osotsi said the Speaker directed Senate committees to work even during the long recess to meet the deadlines, with agencies such as the Office of the Auditor-General, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission and the National Treasury also under pressure to keep pace.

The committee is currently grappling with 560 audit reports, averaging 11 per county. To ensure meaningful scrutiny, Osotsi said counties are being scheduled to appear up to three times between January and March, with only four reports handled per sitting.

“That is not asking too much,” he said.

Osotsi noted that rushing all the reports in a single session would defeat the purpose of oversight.