Kenya's Costly New Parliament

Seats for Members of Parliament were almost $3,000 each.

The 110lb chairs have been installed in the country's lower chamber of parliament at a total cost of more than £650,000, part of a £8 million upgrade to the parliament approved despite the nation's grinding poverty.

An original plan to award the tender to a foreign firm to make the furniture was thrown out when a section of MPs complained that the £3,100-per-chair cost was too high.