Members of Parliament who have not been vaccinated for COVID-19 will not be allowed to attend Parliamentary sittings when the House resumes business after the 10 days recess.

Parliament is set to resume its weekly plenary sittings in the Parliamentary chambers which will house only 100 MPs per sitting.

However, according to the Director of Communications and Public Affairs, Chris Obore, only MPs with vaccination cards will be allowed to access the chambers for House business.

“One of the conditions will be; to attend, you will have to be fully vaccinated to avoid the spread. We think the situation is manageable now with all SOPs in place. With vaccination, there is less risk of infecting others,” Obore said.

Obore noted that MPs, who will be attending the plenary, will be required to present their vaccination cards before they can be admitted into the main parliamentary chambers.

Recently, Parliament embarked on vaccination of all MPs, Parliamentary commission staff and journalists reporting from Parliament as one of the ways to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

To avoid the spread of COVID-19, Parliament last year moved from the Parliamentary chambers to the Parliamentary car Park, which can host more than 300 MPs per sitting.

Parliament has been hiring tents per sitting to act as temporary Parliamentary chambers for Parliament plenary sessions.

However, according to Obore, the Parliament administration has resolved that the hiring of tents stops, and Parliamentary sittings move to the main chambers to save taxpayers money.

“We are going to resume sitting in the old chamber from the tent. We don’t want to keep spending money on tents,” Obore said.

Parliament has spent over sh1b to hire two tents used for plenary sessions due to COVID-19 restrictions.