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{
    "id": 1056486,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1056486/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 178,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Kikuyu, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Kimani Ichung’wah",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1835,
        "legal_name": "Anthony Kimani Ichung'Wah",
        "slug": "anthony-kimani-ichungwah"
    },
    "content": "The other issue of whether I am being listened to is not relevant to me at this particular point. I want to focus on the issues that I was addressing. Indeed, the Leader of the Minority Party has enumerated the level of our public debt. Today we are being asked to approve further borrowing of Kshs930 billion which is Kshs70 billion shy of Kshs1 trillion. In the past, and I have belaboured the point in many forums, this House is asked every year to approve this BPS with an expectation that the annual estimates will be done in line with it, but that never happens. The Chairperson of the Budget and Appropriations Committee and the Leader of the Minority Party have also alluded to that fact. There is a debt mix that we were talking about – the one that the Chair just corrected. There is inconsistency between the BPS and the Medium-Term Debt Management Strategy. The BPS alluded to a net borrowing of about 72 per cent vis-à-vis the 57 per cent that is in MTDS. The MTDS is talking about 43 per cent of net foreign funding whereas the BPS is at a level of about 27.8 per cent. These inconsistencies will manifest themselves further when we come to the Annual Estimates, and most likely, you will find that the Annual Estimates will be done more in line with what is in the BPS and not the MTDS. When you talk about approving a BPS with a very huge deficit, and we then go ahead and do our Annual Estimates based on that, naturally, I will not be shocked if by this time next year, we will be talking of debt levels of close to or above Kshs1 trillion. I am wondering whether we still have space within the debt ceiling. Most likely, in the course of this year, we will be seeing the National Treasury coming back to this House seeking a review of the debt ceiling beyond the Kshs9 trillion. Therefore, it is not right to just accuse the Jubilee Government of doing things, yet it is us who sit in the National Assembly or the Senate and approve these figures. Hon. John Mbadi sat in the Committee today, and the President is listening to him. He sat in the Budget and Appropriations Committee approving Kshs930 billion of debt. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, I beg that you add me the one minute that I was interrupted. If you look at Page 19 of the Report, there is a very huge problem because we have taken the Road Maintenance Levy Fund as part of sharable revenue going to the county governments. We are being dishonest with the people and our county governments. The Road Maintenance Levy Fund Act, 1993, stipulates that these funds should go specifically to maintaining roads in our constituencies at the counties. When we lump these figures as part of our sharable revenue, it is possible that the governors will now utilise this money in other areas away from maintenance of roads. That will be very detrimental even to us as Members of Parliament because the pressure will come back to us to maintain those rural roads that are not being done by the county governments. In closing, I would like to speak about the realism of our revenue estimates. We are talking about revenue estimates of Kshs1.775 trillion in an economy that, in this financial year, we have The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}