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{
    "id": 1025625,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1025625/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 321,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Navakholo, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Emmanuel Wangwe",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2543,
        "legal_name": "Emmanuel Wangwe",
        "slug": "emmanuel-wangwe"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker. At the outset, allow me to support the Report and confirm that I am one of the farmers and I represent sugarcane farmers as well. What has touched me in the report is the revelation that Kshs4.2 billion was collected as deposits and it is still not forwarded to the Commodities Fund. I was the Vice-Chairperson of the Departmental Committee on Agriculture until one month ago. When we were doing the Budget for this year, the Commodities Fund sought for Kshs30 million just to support themselves in terms of operation. We declined but we gave it at the later stage. What is putting us into this position is that AFFA retained the collections that they got and did not forward it to the Commodities Fund. I would want to put my question to the Committee on Implementation. The PFM Act clearly stipulates that you cannot direct or spend public money where the law is not set. That Kshs4.2 billion was supposed to have gone to the Commodities Fund because it was the inheritance organisation that took over the functions of the Sugar Development Fund jointly for coffee and sugar. Therefore, there is a lot of criminology that AFFA and the Ministry have played around. I support the recommendation of the Committee that let there be investigation. I stand here to really support that so that once investigations prove the allegations, let any officer that might have committed an offence be held accountable so that farmers of this country who I represent and who this National Assembly speaks for should not suffer yet they have put somewhere where they are supposed to collect. With that, I wish to support the Report."
}