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{
"id": 1216546,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1216546/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Wambua",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 13199,
"legal_name": "Enoch Kiio Wambua",
"slug": "enoch-kiio-wambua"
},
"content": "Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir, for this opportunity to add my voice on this all-important Bill, the Natural Resources (Benefit Sharing) Bill, 2022 by our friend, our colleague, the Senator of Tana River County, Sen. Mungatana, MGH. Mr. Speaker, Sir, this is a Bill that perhaps should have come to the Senate the day before yesterday. It is very important for counties especially on the matter of sharing benefits for resources found within counties. I go straight to the Bill. In Part One of the Bill, Sen. Mungatana, MGH is proposing the natural resources for which this Act will apply. The Bill lists those resources as sunlight, water resources, forest diversity and genetic resources, wildlife resources, industrial fishing and wind. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I wish I could get the attention of the promoter of this Bill. This is very important. Naturally, when you name one, then you exclude the others. On this matter of the natural resources, I would want to ask Sen. Mungatana, MGH to consider including sand as a natural resource that should be covered in this Bill. I come from a county or a region that perhaps supplies arguably more than 50 per cent of the sand that is used for construction in this city. However, the benefits that go to the people of our region arising from the sand cannot even be computed. The benefits are insignificant. In this Bill, I see an opportunity where then sand becomes a resource for which there are benefits that would go to the communities. I ask the promoter of the Bill to consider including sand in the natural resources. As we debate this Bill, let us all be guided by the need to come up with win-win arrangements. Everybody involved in the extraction of the resources should go home with something significant enough to be happy about. I say this because I have seen situations in the exploitation of resources especially for my county where Government institutions and private entities are just interested in the share of their benefits. They have very little consideration to the people who live in the areas where these resources are exploited from. The percentages proposed by our Senator are fair. This is a fair arrangement and let us pursue it to conclusion. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I also want to go to Part Two of the Bill on the functions of the Commission on Revenue Allocation (CRA). I invite Sen. Mungatana, MGH, to kindly look at the functions assigned to CRA and ensure they do not conflict with the roles that we have assigned to the Benefit Sharing Committees in the counties. If Sen. Mungatana, MGH, will agree to include sand in this, the CRA should not come to Kitui County and begin to dictate what the people of Kitui County should get from their sand resource. Let the role of CRA be facilitated as opposed to helping in making decisions as to what the benefits will be. Looking at this Bill, the functions of the CRA would emasculate the functions of the County Benefit Sharing Committees. Let us be very clear about that. Lastly, so that we also give other Senators a chance to weigh into this, Part Four of the Bill is on Benefit Sharing Agreement. May I remind my brother and colleague, Sen. Mungatana, MGH, that the Senate exists to defend and protect counties and county"
}