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{
    "id": 1119269,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1119269/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 346,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Sakaja",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13131,
        "legal_name": "Johnson Arthur Sakaja",
        "slug": "johnson-arthur-sakaja"
    },
    "content": "We passed The Division of Revenue Bill and counties should be receiving a total of Kshs30.8 billion monthly and then development, Kshs25 billion, which is the smallest. If you total that, it is more than Kshs200 billion a month, yet at our best month, we are collecting Kshs150 billion. We are in a hole. Some simple things need to be done. I do not know why we need to work smart. If 64 per cent of revenue is going to pay debt, for every Kshs1,000 collected in this country, Kshs640 goes to collect debt. You wonder why counties have pending bills. It is because they are told there is no Exchequer. We talk about delayed Exchequer, but why is it delayed? It is not there. The first charge to the consolidated fund is debt serving. If Kshs640 from Kshs1,000 has gone, we are left with Kshs360 and then the immediate concerns are salaries and pensions. What is left to do anything in this country? It is very little. Where does that lead us to? It leads us to more debt. We need to manage our country better. I am shocked that we are now borrowing from the local market to pay external debt. There was a time it was a factor of pride when we would say that there is no foreign money paying a teacher’s salary. That is no foreign money paying a doctor in Kenya. President Mwai Kibaki used to tell us ‘ kulipa ushuru ni kujitegemea’. What was his deficit? The deficit was like 6 per cent; 92 per cent of our budget was locally funded by our taxes. The budgets were not huge. The first trillion budget was in 2009/2010. However, Kenyans can say that during that time we felt a difference and there was money in the pocket. Now, we have huge budgets, but people are frustrated because there is no money in the pockets. Where is it going to? Kshs640 is going to pay debt. The make-up of our debt, which I have looked at presents a serious problem. What affects the local businessmen - the people I represent - in Nyamakima, Gikomba and Makueni in this debt issue is the domestic portion of it. The domestic debt is Kshs4 trillion according to this Report. This is money that could have been in the hands of business people. Businessmen are not getting loans from banks, which bank would give Omogeni and sons a loan of Kshs100 million when the Government wants the same? During that previous time, they used to hawk loans to us even when I was in the university. They used to ask us to open a student’s account, so that we could get a loan to buy a radio. This is because they had to come to us. If you add the issue of the interest rate ceiling that was removed, we are bleeding our businesses in this country. Where will they get access to credit? There is a law and I wish we could improve it. I have seen one of the recommendations is to set a team. In India the ratio of domestic debt by Government is limited. In as much as it is a debt ceiling, you should not look at a debt ceiling in terms of an absolute amount of Kshs9 trillion or Kshs12 trillion as is being proposed. We should look at, of that debt ceiling, how much of it is domestic? Sen. Omogeni, that is what is hurting traders in Kisii and Nyamira. That is where we are feeling the pinch and there is no money in peoples’ pockets."
}