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{
"id": 1402661,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402661/?format=api",
"text_counter": 160,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "In Baringo County, MCAs threatened to impeach a CECM because he had not shaved his beard. In Kirinyaga County, between 2013 and 2017, MCAs wanted to impeach a speaker because he chewed gum in the chamber. You might be disappointed by a person's behavior, but that is not enough grounds to remove him or her from office. You better resign yourself for not wanting to see such a person. I agree that we need to relook this issue of the County Governments Act. The Senate Majority Leader has called it the 'bible' of counties. I will call it the constitution of counties. This is the law that all counties use to run their affairs. Instead of amending the law as it is, we should take section by section and develop a new law on how it should be governed. If it is touching on public finance management, we take that section and make a stand-alone law, the way we are making a stand-alone impeachment Bill on county governments. I urge Senators to read that law. As we read it, we should develop more laws that will help govern the counties. One of the ingredients that is a catalyst for the removal of people from office is emotions. The law I will present in this House in the next few weeks is removing those emotions by increasing the number of days from when a CECM is supposed to be removed from the three to seven days to 21 days. At that particular time, emotions will have cooled down and people will start seeing things directly. Once the Motion of removal of a CECM is approved by the Clerk after meeting the requisite requirement, within seven days, the MCA is supposed to table it on the Floor of the county assembly. Once it is tabled as a notice of motion, the county assembly will require 14 more days to discuss it. After that, they will have a committee to investigate the CECM, which will take another 14 days. If they remove the CECM, the county assembly informs the Governor within three days. The Governor has two options. The first option is to dismiss the CECM. The second is to write memoranda to the county assembly explaining why he disagrees. Once they see the memorandum, the county assembly can discuss it, agree or disagree with the governor. Once they disagree with the governor, they vote again. This way, we will allow everybody to be heard. The governor should be a witness to the CECM. The governor should be standing at the dock. I would like to explain to this House, for us to understand who a CECM is. The CECM is a watchman who stands by the gate to see who goes in or out. He does not sign any documents. He sits in the cabinet with the governor and passes programmes. Once they pass them, they inform the chief officer, and the accounting officer, who can implement the programmes from behind the CECM's back. We should change the law and make the CECM a CO. You should have two positions. The CECM and a CO should be in person. This will help to reduce the wage bill. Why do we have a CECM who attends the meetings of the governor and tells someone else to implement? These are some of the things we should be discussing. I believe that once we get there, everyone will understand. Sen. Orwoba asked what next? We should come up with a law that says that even after an impeachment, what next? Within the Bill that is coming, I feel like I am moving, but it is good to help the Members understand where we are headed. We have said there should be no replacement of a CECM after the impeachment. There should be no The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
},
{
"id": 1402662,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402662/?format=api",
"text_counter": 161,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "replacement of a deputy governor, even after impeachment, within 14 days until we give the deputy governor or the governor an opportunity to go to court. We are not “gods” at the Senate. We cannot say that our decision is final. We have just been told that Governor Mike Sonko was never removed fairly. If we gave him an opportunity to go to court and the timelines, probably, he would be safe by today. I will give another example of Kiambu County. I like talking about my county. Even if Governor Waititu was impeached by this House, the people of Kiambu knew there was no requisite numbers at the County Assembly of Kiambu County. The other day, the former Speaker of Kiambu County Assembly, Hon. Stephen Ndichu, was on radio and he said he did not know what happened. He said \"mashetani ilikuwa kwakichwa \". He knows there were no numbers to impeach the Governor. The people of Kiambu heard him say that there were no numbers when impeaching Governor Waititu. He was also impeached in the Senate and now he can never vie for office or take any public seat because politics was the issue at that particular time. We should come up with a law that tells MCAs if they impeach a person, they should, first of all, give us the video evidence, the HANSARD and the number of votes. If there is an MCA who says they never voted, we should listen to them first. As I conclude, it is good that we look at this County Governments Act with a fine-tooth comb, so that we help the counties. I dare say that between 2013 and 2017 and 2017 and 2022, it was the national Government that was trying to kill devolution. However, between 2022 going to 2027, county governments are being killed within. Governors and probably representatives at the ward level are the ones killing counties. Therefore, we must work to empower them. I do not agree with Sen. M. Kajwang’. He said that the oversight role should be taken away from MCAs. Instead, they should be empowered, so that they can ask questions that we ask in the Senate. Let us empower MCAs for them to understand that their role is to ask governors questions about monies that we send to county governments. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, I know this Bill has taken our focus away from devolution and oversight by the Senate because of the Bunge Tower. Allow me also say something on that issue. That matter is with my Committee. If there is a committee that never jokes around with issues, it is my Committee. I am not saying that no one is like them, but I must be proud of my Members. I have Sen. Chute, Sen. Sifuna, Sen. Tobiko, Sen. Kinyua, Sen. Wambua and Sen. M. Kajwang’. Look at that combination. We are going to look into this matter to the end. If it gets to a point where we need to summon the contractor who built that building, we will do so. We will summon everybody, so that we get to the bottom of this matter, to know why this building took that long, why they over bloated the expenditure and why they are not answering questions that we are asking. We do not even know how many floors are in that building. A building of so many floors has a report of about 13 pages. I mean, if you have at least one page per floor, there should be more pages to tell us how you did it and how you got to that point. Therefore, I support everybody who says that we should look into the issue of the Bunge Tower, even if it was constructed by our brother or sister. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
},
{
"id": 1402663,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402663/?format=api",
"text_counter": 162,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "The other day when the Deputy Governor of Kisii was impeached, you could hear his brother saying the man must go. Even if our brothers are not doing the right thing, we, as the Senate, should tell them to return what they have taken from this Parliament. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, with all those many remarks, I support that we should have a higher threshold to remove CECMs. As I support, the law, which is a step by step process, is in the pipeline. I hope Members will support it. I thank you."
},
{
"id": 1402664,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402664/?format=api",
"text_counter": 163,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Wakili Sigei",
"speaker_title": "The Temporary Speaker",
"speaker": null,
"content": " Proceed, Sen. Kavindu Muthama."
},
{
"id": 1402665,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402665/?format=api",
"text_counter": 164,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Kavindu Muthama",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 13733,
"legal_name": "Agnes Kavindu Muthama",
"slug": "agnes-kavindu-muthama"
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"content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, for giving me this opportunity to, first of all, congratulate Sen. Cherarkey, the Senator for Nandi, for bringing this Amendment Bill on the threshold by county assemblies to impeach CECMs. I would like Sen. Cherarkey and the committee that will deal with this Bill to establish how MCAs can be empowered in order to summon CECMs to county assemblies for questioning, just like we, Senators, summon Cabinet Secretaries here to question them. They only question CECMs at the committee level, which is not enough for them. Secondly, as we recommended the threshold to be two-thirds of MCAs, we should also think about a county assembly legislation to protect both CECMs, county assemblies and governors. For example, if Cabinet Secretaries do not deliver, all the blame goes to the President. Anybody who stands accuses the President, yet it is Cabinet Secretaries who are failing in their dockets where they are supposed to deliver. We should also look into that at the county level. Before a governor fails, CECMS will have failed because they are given dockets to assist. If it were possible for governors to deliver on their own at the county level, they would not have appointed CECMs. The same thing applies to the President and Cabinet Secretaries. Therefore, there is a gap somewhere, which should be looked into by this Senate, so that we streamline things. The MCAs in county assemblies are not doing their work of oversight of governors because they have no funds. Why has the Government not given MCAs a fund, so that they are independent? As long as they continue depending on governors to deliver in their wards, they will never perform oversight properly. To enable them to work, we must find a way for them to get direct money. When I was in the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI), we recommended that we have Kshs20 million go directly to enable them to do work in their wards, so that they are not at the mercy of governors. That would have enabled them to oversight governors properly without fear that there will be no development in their wards. If they do not have any developments in their wards, they risk being re-elected. As we protect counties as Senators, we should also protect MCAs as well because we are defenders of devolution. We should make sure that governors, MCAs and CECMs do what they are supposed to do. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, with those few remarks, I support but with those many amendments. Let us check from the top because if we only correct things at the county and not national level, we will not be doing anything. Sen. Cherarkey and Sen. Thang’wa should sit down, see where gaps are in this Bill, and make sure it flows from the Executive down to county assemblies. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
},
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"id": 1402666,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402666/?format=api",
"text_counter": 165,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Kavindu Muthama",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 13733,
"legal_name": "Agnes Kavindu Muthama",
"slug": "agnes-kavindu-muthama"
},
"content": "Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, I have also heard so many stories about hon. Sonko’s impeachment. At that time, I was not in the Senate. I have heard many Senators saying that hon. Sonko was impeached for no good reason. It could not just be him alone; perhaps there are others. We should look at the threshold for impeachment of governors and come up with a law that will not be compromised; either by the Senate or county assemblies. That will help us to move forward as a nation. On the issue of Bunge Tower, it should be looked into to clear any doubt about its construction. If it is okay, we clear the doubt. If not, then the law should be followed to the letter. Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Temporary Speaker, Sir. I support."
},
{
"id": 1402667,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402667/?format=api",
"text_counter": 166,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Wakili Sigei",
"speaker_title": "The Temporary Speaker",
"speaker": null,
"content": " Thank you, Sen. Kavindu Muthama. Sen. Chute, proceed."
},
{
"id": 1402668,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402668/?format=api",
"text_counter": 167,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Chute",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 13583,
"legal_name": "Chute Mohamed Said",
"slug": "chute-mohamed-said"
},
"content": "Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, Sir. I am happy to get this opportunity to also support this Bill’s amendment by the distinguished Senator for Nandi County, Sen. Cherarkey. Article 179 (3) up to 180 talks about County Executive Committees (CECs). This amendment is very crucial and it came at the right time. Removing a CEC member with one-third is not justifiable. What Sen. Cherarkey has done is commendable. We need to have two-thirds majority, as he has said, to enhance this threshold. We need to sit with Sen. Cherarkey to add a few amendments here and there. It is very important for us to make sure that CECs are protected. If you look at the way CECMs are handled in the counties, in fact, it is like they are flower girls for governors. A CECM has no authority to sign any financial documents. The person in charge of finances are Chief Officers (COs). When they sit in the Cabinet with the governor, they make amendments, laws and have plans for up to five years. However, a CECM will only do what the governor wants. Most governors are threatening the CECMs and COs to do whatever they want. In some instances, letters are written from another office, including award of tenders. Then, the name of that CO is written below the letters, which will be brought to the CO for the signature. Mr. Speaker, Sir, the biggest problem we have in the counties is corruption. That is why you see a governor can promise somebody a contract without going through a normal tendering system. Sen. Cherarkey, in his wisdom, brought this amendment, so that a governor cannot influence the MCAs to remove a CECM. Having said that, we also have another problem of salaries of the MCAs in the counties. An MCA in Marsabit County Assembly earns about Kshs150,000. Let me give you an example of an MCA from Ileret. Marsabit is almost over 500 kilometres from Ileret. It takes you two days to go to Ileret. The road and security is very bad, yet you expect this man to travel all the way to Eldoret. The fuel he uses to go to Ileret and come back is not less than about Kshs60,000. The same MCA is having issues in the villages, such as weddings, funerals, harambees and many other small jobs, and then you expect the same MCAs to come and make laws in the county assemblies. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
},
{
"id": 1402669,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402669/?format=api",
"text_counter": 168,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Chute",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 13583,
"legal_name": "Chute Mohamed Said",
"slug": "chute-mohamed-said"
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"content": "Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, if you want to amend these laws, we need to help our MCAs get a salary of at least not less than Kshs400,000 a month. If we want them to do a very good job, we must empower them. Some people are saying MCAs are removing governors and deputy governors from the offices, and that they can be influenced to do so. Probably that can happen because they do not have enough money to attend their own personal things, like taking their children to school. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, I will tell you today, how do you expect an MCA to oversight a CECM who is earning over Kshs400,000? How can that be possible? It is not possible. He cannot work efficiently because he is not being paid well. If we want efficient control of the county governments, we need to pay our MCAs well. This proposed amendment needs to be looked into. In fact, we need to add a few things. I met the former Governor for Nairobi City County, Hon. Mike Sonko, about an hour ago in this premises. The way he was removed from office was unconstitutional. There should be a way of asking him to bring a Petition to this House because the way he was removed was totally unconstitutional and irregular. The laws of impeaching governors should be looked into. We need to do amendments. That amendment can go as far as after they have been impeached in this House. This matter needs to go to the courts, for the courts to say, yes, this person was removed regularly. Mr. Speaker, Sir, some people are saying Governor Sonko was removed from office from “up there”, but I want to differ with them. This is because, the same Senators, some of them are in this Parliament even now, removed Sonko from office. If they wanted to defy the issue of “up there,” they should have refused. I am very grateful that our President is not following that. He says no, because he goes to church every Sunday and believes in God. Removing a governor elected by over 500,000 voters in some instances, by about 30 to 40 people, is not the right thing to do. Article 181 talks about the removal of a governor. Article 181 (c) talks about abuse of office and gross misconduct. What is this gross misconduct? When we removed the Deputy Governor for Kisii County, they were talking about money that was sent to him, about Kshs800,000. Is that gross misconduct? This is what we need discuss. I am happy with this Bill, but we need to do further amendments. We need to have a discussion on the governors’ issue. I have a proposed Amendment Bill, on the governors coming before this House. We were just discussing which particular day is convenient for the House and the management of this House. So, any time we agree, this proposed Bill will come before this House. I am sure, Sen. Cherarkey will support me on that. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, there is this issue of Bunge Tower. I brought a Statement to this House regarding the same. I happen to be in the Standing Committee for Roads and Transportation and the answers we got from that statement were shocking and quite unbelievable. The initial cost of building was Kshs5 billion, and it was supposed to be completed after two years. Surprisingly, we were told that the contract was increased from initial cost of Kshs5 billion to Kshs9.6 billion, and it took 11 years to complete. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
},
{
"id": 1402670,
"url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1402670/?format=api",
"text_counter": 169,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Chute",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 13583,
"legal_name": "Chute Mohamed Said",
"slug": "chute-mohamed-said"
},
"content": "Even some items, specifically, electrical items, are already outdated. They cannot be used now. They need to remove most of them. The main contractor had so many sub-contractors, you could not even know who was doing what. That was the Statement from Parliamentary Service Commission (PSC). There is an elephant in the room; the Parliamentary Joint Services led by a Director General. Next week, I will bring a statement in that regard. We want to know how much budget they have and how that money is used. I also thank Sen. Wambua. He brought up an issue of employees who were interdicted because they invited some media people into that building. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, the Bunge Tower is not the only issue we have, there is something else happening in this Parliament. They are doing something called the Physical Security Information Management System (PSIM), which is contracted to a contractor. I am told that it is already going into Kshs6 billion. Next week, I am also going to bring a statement. We want this House to be furnished with documents that show the exact position when they started that project and where we are now, how much money was tendered for, how much was already spent, what is the balance payable and if the work is complete and/or when it will be completed. Just like Sen. Wamuba said, we need to start to clean our house first. We call governors and Cabinet Secretary because of corruption, we also need to clean our house first. The Speaker of the National Assembly said that he is going to punish those people who are asking these questions. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, we are elected on behalf of 60 million people of this country and we do not fear anyone except our God. We will ask questions today, tomorrow and as long as we are in this House. In support of Sen. Cherarkey’s Bill, next week, I urge that that we sit and discuss this amendment and see how we can help add more to it. I support this Bill."
}
]
}