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{
    "id": 1056459,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1056459/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 151,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Suba South, ODM",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. John Mbadi",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 110,
        "legal_name": "John Mbadi Ng'ong'o",
        "slug": "john-mbadi"
    },
    "content": "The Fiscal Management Act of 2009 required the Government to submit the BPS to Parliament for review and approval. Again, this was reemphasised under the PFM Act 2021, but the mood and the spirit of this requirement has not been carried to the BPS. I want to remind and, may be, inform the House that one country that has a long history with BPS is New Zealand, but if you look at their BPS for this year, it is just 28 pages. Ours is 143 pages. Those who like reading could go and read the BPS of New Zealand and compare it with ours. I want to describe our BPS as a forest of words, but a desert of policies and strategies. The challenge I have with the BPS is on the issue of interpretation of statutes and their financial implications. The law underpinning the NG-CDF provides that at least 2.57 per cent of ordinary revenue should be appropriated to be credited to the NG-CDF for disbursement to constituencies. However, almost every year, the NG-CDF is never fully disbursed. The PFM Act, 2012 provides that any commitments that are legally payable and remain unpaid in a financial year should form first charge in the next financial year, but when projects funded by CDF are not issued with the Exchequer by the end of the financial year, they should be funded in the next financial year. It, therefore, follows that when we appropriate for a new financial year, the amount for the current year and the arrears for the previous year should always be taken into consideration. Applying the law properly, it would mean that the Kshs26 billion that has so far been disbursed this year is still financing projects of the previous year. It is unfortunate that the Executive, and in particular the National Treasury, is interpreting the law to suit themselves. Secondly, with regard to what we call the Road Maintenance Levy Fund (RMF), the proposal from the National Treasury is to remove this Fund - the 15 per cent that goes to the counties – from being a conditional grant to a shareable revenue Fund. Therefore, it means there is nothing that will force the counties to apply the 15 per cent from the Road Maintenance Levy Fund in maintaining our roads. What is the effect of that? Counties can even use that money for buying tea, fuelling cars and other operational expenses and our roads will continue to deteriorate because there will be no maintenance."
}