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{
    "id": 583974,
    "url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/583974/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 333,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, this Senate will not tire to support county governments and ensure that the issues that we need addressed are, indeed, addressed. We will also not tire to ask for accountability from them. I attended the International Day of Peace in my county last Monday and I took time to educate the people of Nandi County who attended the function on the role of the Senate, governors, county assemblies and even national Government institutions within the county. When you point out some of these issues like most of my colleagues continue to point out, you are labeled as fighting the governor. You are seen as if you are fighting the county government and they start branding you. I want to say that when we are passing important useful Bills to the counties like we are doing today, like we have always done even with the Division of Revenue and County Allocation of Revenue Bills, we are the darlings of the county governments and the governors. When we ask for accountability, we appear to be the ones fighting them. We want to tell the county governments that they cannot have their cake and eat it. They must be prepared to benefit from the services of the Senate, but they must be prepared to be held to account. Every individual in this country who desires to serve in a public office must be prepared to be subjected to checks and balances. The resources that we continue to devote in this Senate to our county governments are not individual resources. These are resources that come from our own citizens. They are taxes and we cannot allow a situation where we have individuals running around, misusing resources in our counties as if they are individual and personal resources. We cannot continue seeing complete misuse of resources, complete mis-prioritization of resources within our counties. The last two weeks have been exciting and interesting. You hear of a unique wheelbarrow as it was mentioned by colleagues; you hear of a contractor being given a contract to open a facebook account; you hear of a gate costing Kshs13 million in Nyamira; in my place, you hear of a gate costing Kshs14 million or whatever figure it is; curtains costing Kshs7.2 million. It is a shame that in the same counties where the county government has spent Kshs7 million or Kshs13 million to build a gate, a referral hospital has no drugs. They do not have essential facilities within the hospital. It begs the question; what makes up a healthy facility? Is it the gate? Why are we focused on aesthetics instead of looking at the real core business within our counties? Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, when I hear that a county is building a gate including a petrol station, you ask yourself; has the county government turned into a businessman? Turning a petrol station, what will wananchi do? We need to be serious in the manner in which we run public affairs. When we raise some of these issues it is because we feel for our counties. We feel for the residents who voted for us and up to now their lives have not changed yet the counties have received a lot of resources. I want to tell the governors on behalf of this Senate that they need to prepare. The next one and a half or two years, we will push them to ensure that they are accountable. In my county, one of the senior county government officers had the audacity to tell members of the public to forget about the misuse in the last one or two years and that they did not know what they were doing. Therefore starting this year they will start working for them. I want to tell them that there is no provision for not knowing what you were supposed to be doing. The law is clear. They ought to have known. If they did not know what they were doing, then why did they ask for those seats? Ignorance is no excuse in law. I need to tell them that The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}