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{
    "id": 1232102,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1232102/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 491,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Sifuna",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13599,
        "legal_name": "Sifuna Edwin Watenya",
        "slug": "sifuna-edwin-watenya"
    },
    "content": "Madam Temporary Speaker, let me address two final points. One was raised by my colleague from Taita-Taveta County. If you look at the marginal increase of the money that will go to the counties, that is only 4 per cent. What will go to the national Government is 23 per cent. That is over Kshs400 billion. The current administration told us that they were going to cut Kshs300 billion from the current budget in the expenditure of the national Government, but we are not seeing it. What we are asking for on behalf of the counties is just 10 per cent of that Kshs400 billion that is being increased to go to the national Government. We believe that this is something that counties should get. Finally, the Committee on Finance and Budget must request the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) to show us all the income and expenditure of this country, so that we know whether we are being told the truth about the monies that are being transacted in the CBK accounts. The money that is collected from taxes is not the only revenue that goes to the Government. We need full disclosure on this even as we have this debate. The CoB should explain to us why it is important for her to approve expenditure for unnecessary things that are asked for by the national Government, including salaries for Chief Administrative Secretaries (CASs). Yet she does not approve any of these similarly for the county governments and they continue to suffer. In conclusion, let us do what we were elected to do. I am heartbroken to hear Senators who I know their counties require more resources because of political expediency, coming here to argue that the Kshs385 billion proposed is enough. I have never seen anyone who has been given an opportunity to increase the stock of their own people giving up out of political expediency. Here in Nairobi, we have more than enough problems. We just opened an Intensive Care Units (ICU) at Mama Lucy Kibaki Hospital because we did not have. We want extra money to complete construction of the maternity wing with ICU beds at Mama Lucy Kibaki Hospital. A Senator has just raised a question on the state of City Mortuary. We would like to have enough resources to hire people who had been employed under Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS) because 700 of them have been thrown out unceremoniously. They have nowhere go and they have no money because they have not been paid for the past five months. When I speak to my county governor, he always tells me that we people in the Senate are the ones supposed to give them money. If we do not give them money, how are they supposed to pay suppliers and former employees of NMS? Madam Temporary Speaker, we as the minority feel very strongly that we must bring amendments to this Bill that was passed by the National Assembly, so that we push this to the figure that was recommended by the CRA, who are the experts under the"
}