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{
    "id": 1082982,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1082982/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 221,
    "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": "to survive for the 12 months. Otherwise, what we are doing in this House is to put a Budget which ends up being changed three times in a financial year. That cannot help a country move forward. This House must send a very strong warning that going to 2021/2022 Financial Year; we are not likely to support multiple supplementary budgets because, clearly, it is a case of lack of proper planning. Hon. Speaker, the Supplementary Budget was prepared with two objectives. Number one was to provide funds to support the fight against COVID-19. At least that was met by the provision of Ksh7.6 billion to supply vaccines to the Kenyan public. However, there is a catch that we are providing funds but I hope we are not providing opportunity for fraudsters, for people who like to take advantage of miseries of the citizens of this country, to make billions and become billionaires. I want to repeat that it is through supplementary budgets that mega thefts in this country have been perpetuated. I just hope that our relevant committees, more particularly the Departmental Committee on Health and to some extent the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), will ensure that the money that we are allocating… The Ksh7 billion plus is not pocket change, it is a lot of money. Kenyans should now be laughing in the next one month because everyone should get vaccinated. Those who should be vaccinated should get vaccinated because finances have been provided. The World Bank is adding more. Much as we hail the steps taken by the National Treasury to provide more funds, we want to caution those who are going to take advantage and swindle these funds that this House will be watching. I hope our oversight committees will not disappoint us on that. Hon. Speaker, the other objective was the issue of pending bills that has not been addressed even though it was supposed to be one of the objectives for this Supplementary Budget. The Cabinet Secretary should not entertain Kenyans with rhetoric. If you are talking about payment of pending bills and putting timelines, it should be backed by action through budgetary provisions. If you look at the Supplementary Budget II, there is no specific allocation to take care of these pending bills. You can find some amounts dropped here and there in the Ministry of Interior and Coordination of National Government and in the Ministry of Education, but a serious attempt to make sure that ministries, departments and State agencies, settle the pending bills which have become a thorn in the flesh of Kenyans, is lacking in this Supplementary Budget and it continues to lack in all budgets that are prepared and presented to this House. Until when will we be talking about pending bills without action? Action needs to be taken. In fact, a policy is already in place. The Public Finance Management (PFM) Act has not been amended which clearly stipulates that pending bills become the first charge wherever any ministry, department, state agency and any county government receives money from national Government or on source revenue, the first settlement should be the pending bills. I do not even understand this argument where ministries are still saying that they have not been provided with money to settle pending bills, yet they have a budget. They should first settle the pending bills and legal pending bills. Again, the concern we have is that pending bills have become a conduit; they have become a system through which embezzlement of funds take place in this country. Unless some policy direction is given and until some action is taken against those who are misusing these pending bills, we will not end pending bills. Since people have discovered that that is the route to quickly make money, we will not clear the pending bills in this country. The agencies that deal with matters of economic crime need to look at the issue of pending bills. All ministries, departments and agencies need to look into that and find out how those pending bills came about and why they cannot be cleared. Some people just do not want pending bills to be cleared. You can see that in 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."
}