Our History

The Parliamentary Service Commission Regulations, 2011, which were gazetted in Legal Notice No. 95 of July 22, 2011, vest the management of the Centre in a Board which is responsible for the policy direction of the Centre.

The Centre for Parliamentary Studies and Training (CPST) was established by the Parliamentary Service Commission (PSC) in December 2008 and legalized by the publication of the Parliamentary Service Regulations, 2011 in the Kenya Gazette, Subsidiary Legislation, and Legal Notice No. 95 of July 22, 2011. In addition to serving the members and staff of Kenya Parliament, Commission Paper No. 286 of September 26, 2009, expands its objectives and mandate, to serve other stakeholders, who may be interested in gaining an appreciable understanding of Parliament, to also serve the Parliaments of the East African Community, the Great Lakes Region and the Continent of Africa at large but not limiting ourselves from engagement with other global Parliamentary institutions.

The purpose and objective of establishing CPST, was to have a one-stop specialized Resource Centre for the training and capacity development of both the members and staff of Parliament of Kenya, County Assemblies and other Legislatures.

The CPST is currently enhancing the capacities of the Members and Staff in the County Assemblies through training. Since year 2013, we successfully trained all our clients in all the six thematic areas with the CPST curriculum. This curriculum was revised in year 2014 to take care of the interest of minority interest groups including women. Among our premier courses as reflected in our annual training calendar include Public Finance Management; Hansard; Litigation and Procedure; the Role and Responsibilities of County Assembly Service Board, Role and Mandate of Committees, Public participation, Scrutiny and Oversight and Parliamentary Leadership.

Directorates & Departments

The CPST is one of the Directorates in the Parliamentary Service Commission. The services are as follows: the Joint Services which is headed by the Director General; the National Assembly headed by the Clerk of the National Assembly; and the Senate. The Clerk of the Senate is the secretary to the PSC. The CPST Management Board (The CPST Board) is responsible for the administration of the centre. The CPST as the training arm of (PSC) was established by Parliament under the legal Notice No. 95 of 22nd July, 2011 has two directorates which are headed by Senior Deputy Directors who report to The CPST Director. Currently, each of the two directorates has a department underneath. The department of Resource Mobilisation and Public Relations in under the Directorate of Administration and Corporate Affairs while the Technical and Legislative Training department is under the directorate of curriculum, training and research. The process of expanding these management units as per The CPST Strategic Plan is well underway.