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"speaker_name": "Sen. Kibiru",
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"legal_name": "Charles Reubenson Kibiru",
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"content": "Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, we all know that County Assemblies are the first line of oversight. We felt as a committee – I believe the Senate agrees with us - that we need to ensure our counterparts are well taken care of especially when it comes to issues of resources. This is because we all know the county executives more often than not hold a carrot and stick on the County Assemblies. We want autonomy which will also come in another Bill which we are proposing on the PFM Act. Provision of Ksh980,327,527 for counties to clear their pending bills. The Committee recommends that these funds should only be released after verification of pending bills by the Controller of Budget (CoB). We thought it is prudent because we have all heard about these pending bills, that we put a caveat. That is why we are saying the funds will be paid subject to approval or verification by the CoB. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, as we may observe, the effect of the assignation of these funds to the 35 county assemblies therefore has the effect of increasing expenditure ceiling from this financial year. It is therefore prudent to note that the increase in the ceiling has been occasioned by this special dispensation to enable the clearing of pending bills. Regarding the Senate resolution that the county government should rationalize the staff establishment before 2021, the Committee recommends that the same be extended to June, 2023. The Members of the County Public Accounts and Investment Committee (CPAIC) know that this issue has been raised by the Auditor-General and very few counties have been able to adhere to that. We heard the prayer from those who submitted especially the county assemblies that they be allowed to extend. Remember, they need resources to do the rationalization. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, as I conclude my Report, I want to make a few remarks. First, is to thank the Committee that I worked with; my Committee. We put in a lot of effort. We met very frequently and we churned out a lot of reports. Kudos to my Committee Members and the Secretariat for making sure that we get this Report. On the County Governments Grant Bill, we have had challenges. When we call the stakeholders, it seems that the National Treasury, the Attorney-General and the Council of Governors (CoG) had a problem in trying to agree on the best mechanisms on how to interpret or implement the rulings of the court. We found as a committee, that it is important that we make a legislation and that is why we have proposed that Bill. The Bill has already been published and is undergoing concurrence with the Speaker of the National Assembly. When it comes, we will proceed and we will ask the Senators to help us pass the Bill so that we can also be able to allocate the conditional grants. Mr. Temporary Speaker, moving forward, we have been asked by the Governors that we need to rein in on the National Treasury. What came up as we debated on the Bill is that the National Treasury operates with some impunity. They are not disbursing money as per the law. This is a law we are passing, and we expect it to be adhered to. The schedules once passed should be followed to the letter."
}