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{
    "id": 1126940,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1126940/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 419,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Kisumu East, Independent",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Shakeel Shabbir",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 140,
        "legal_name": "Ahmed Shakeel Shabbir Ahmed",
        "slug": "shakeel-shabbir"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker. I want to take up from where my colleagues stopped. The purpose and object of the County Governments Grants Bill is to put together a framework to support Article 202 on conditional allocation and to facilitate the transfer of conditional and non-conditional allocations. That is what the Bill says. When you look at the attachments, you see a problem. The problem of conditional grants is exactly that—it is a conditional grant. A conditional grant can be accepted or rejected by a county government. The last page of this document says every county government in Kenya got Ksh153,297,872 as a conditional grant for leasing medical equipment. This Bill has not addressed the point of being given a conditional grant that you do not think is value for money. I know, for a fact, that certain county governments said they did not want this grant for medical equipment. Indeed, the First Schedule shows that every county government has actually been given the conditional grant! The question is: what happens when a conditional grant is given to you and you use it for something else? That is not provided for in this Bill! The other conditional grants are IDA World Bank Transforming Health Systems for Universal Health Care Project; IDA World Bank Credit—National Agricultural and Rural Inclusive Growth Project; IDA Kenya Climate Smart Agricultural Project; and, EU Grant—Instruments for Devolution Advice and Support. There are about 14 conditional grants. Does that mean that when the World Bank sends Kisumu County money for transforming health systems and we feel that the conditional grant does not match our needs, we have to take it? It appears that conditional grants are automatic. Whatever is given will be divided among the 47 county governments. I cannot understand the logic. I share Hon. Sankok’s concern. Maybe I do not understand this Bill: It literally lays out conditional allocations and gives county governments no particular say. It says the amounts will be given out without going through the Consolidated Fund accounts of respective county governments. Whatever problems we have with the Consolidated Fund, it has one strength. It has control mechanisms. I wonder whether this grants system is going to bypass the Consolidated Fund. Do we have mechanisms to make sure that we do not end up with something like the Arror Dam scandal in the counties? Let us say the World Bank has given us so much money for climate change. So we divide that money among the 47 counties the way they have done with health funds. Does that mean that there is no mechanism for understanding the needs of the counties? Does it mean there is no mechanism for saying that this is how we should do? Does it mean there is no 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."
}