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{
    "id": 1034169,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1034169/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 393,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Wajir North, ODM",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Ibrahim Ahmed",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13505,
        "legal_name": "Ahmed Abdisalan Ibrahim",
        "slug": "ahmed-abdisalan-ibrahim"
    },
    "content": "Departmental Committee for making such a big sacrifice of visiting so many project sites. I have no doubt that, that has not been an easy task. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, in 2013, the Government promised to build five world class stadia. Garissa, Mombasa, Eldoret, Kisumu and Nakuru were supposed to have a world class stadium each. However, during the run up to the 2017 General Elections, the Government started to refurbish the existing facilities in those places instead of building world class stadia. So, the Government did not meet the expectations of the electorate. It is important that we take note of the fact that in respect of all the ongoing projects in the country, the works done do not match the amounts of money that have been paid by the Government Departments or State corporations. It is very interesting. The same concern has been raised by this Committee. There is a tendency of paying contractors more than what they do. Indeed, that has been clearly seen in the Report by the Departmental Committee on Sports, Culture and Tourism. For example, they mention that the works that have been done at Karatu Stadium are only 25 per cent, but the amount of money paid is more than 39 per cent of the contract sum. That is very interesting. You wonder why those departments or State corporations would want to rush to pay the contractors more than the works done. We have, in a number of cases, seen contractors who have abandoned sites just because what they have is more than what they have done. This is very interesting. The same happened at Wote Stadium. According to the Report by the Committee, about 25 per cent of works had been done at Wote Stadium, but the contractors had been paid more than 28 per cent of the contract sum. That is very interesting. Another very interesting thing is that those who are charged with the responsibility of undertaking monitoring and evaluation of the projects have a tendency of colluding with contractors by reporting more than the works that have been done by the contractors. That could be the case with Marsabit Stadium, although the Report is not clear on the same. This is a very interesting issue that we really need to look into critically. Secondly, the Department of Public Works is responsible for supervision of public works, but you find that most of the contractors engage private consultants. The audit by the Committee shows that a number of contractors engaged private consultants. They have a tendency of exaggerating the figures. Value for money is totally absent and you wonder why that is the case. There is a whole Government department called Public Works Department, which is supposed to be dealing with supervision of public works. You ignore them and start engaging private consultants. That is very interesting. Thirdly, distribution of stadia in this country, as noted in this Report, is totally unacceptable. That is what we do on a day-to-day basis in other sectors. Why should you have all the stadia concentrated in one region, while many other regions do not have any?"
}