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{
    "id": 1169610,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1169610/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 239,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. (Dr.) Mwaura",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13129,
        "legal_name": "Isaac Maigua Mwaura",
        "slug": "isaac-mwaura"
    },
    "content": "Madam Temporary Speaker, this issue of public debt cannot be left to regulations. It should be a matter of law that we should be amending a statute to increase our public debt. That is why, as you can see, it is coming at the tail-end of the 12th Parliament, yet even now, we do not have the numbers. It is a serious public debate. People are now trying to survive politically, yet this is the one thing that I would once say without a doubt that the Jubilee administration has gotten wrong. We were not bold enough to reduce the number of state agencies. They are 247 of them. We were not bold enough to recalibrate the budget to accommodate the county governments and cede ground and power as per the Fourth Schedule of the Constitution. The National Government should not perform the roles of the county governments. Right now, when we look at the promises that are being made, like the Kshs6,000 per month for two million or so families it is going to require another Kshs200 billion or more for it to be implemented. Is it workable in such a kind of a budget? It will only call for further borrowing. Madam Temporary Speaker, this public debt as someone may have actually put it, only Kshs1 trillion can only make this Financial Year and the next Financial Year. After about one financial year, we still need to borrow. In fact, projections are that if we do not make significant and radical changes in the next 18 months, we are going the Greece way. This is a very serious debate. We are told about countries like Japan, that they have borrowed over two hundred times of their economy, but produce. I am sure everyone here drives or has ever driven Toyota at some point. Madam Temporary Speaker, in this country, we are more preoccupied with the politics of the day. We hear there is a promise from our competitors that a country will only grow if we have a ballooning or a burgeoning private sector. So, be it. However, it cannot grow when Government is crowding it out over borrowing for nothing. Right now, it is not even clear that these monies that we have borrowed; what is the clear-cut separation between recurrent and development expenditure. Madam Temporary Speaker, the same Public Finance Management (PFM) law requires that 70 per cent of the monies should be recurrent and 30 per cent should be development. A cursory look at how the collective, cumulative budgets of counties are doing is that most counties are doing 88 per cent recurrent and 12 per cent development. That is why if one is contracted by any county government, for you to be paid is a problem. Today, I got a call from a Mr. Oluoch who did some engineering services at Kiambu County Government and has not been paid for over two years. It is just a paltry Kshs1.9 million. Madam Temporary Speaker, we are going to face the same problem. If Parliament was to stump its foot down and refuse to increase the public debt ceiling, it would make the Government to reduce the budget. If it reduces the budget, it would therefore mean that we must now reprioritise that which we require to do because Kenya is not ending. When you look at the budgeting problem, it is because we do it every year, but very few programmes can be completed within the cycle of a financial year of Government. Madam Temporary Speaker, if we are to do what was practised under the late Kibaki’s administration, the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) as it was"
}