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{
"id": 1464051,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1464051/?format=api",
"text_counter": 386,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Kiharu, UDA",
"speaker_title": "Hon. Ndindi Nyoro",
"speaker": null,
"content": "will top up the other Ksh2,500. The essence is that this money is going to county governments to pay healthcare promoters rather than one person receiving two sets of salaries. That money is among the allocations we are debating today. However, this money has been slashed a little bit. We may need to top up in the ensuing Supplementary Estimates to cover the difference. This is a revolutionary thing. It covers over 103,000 Kenyan healthcare promoters in various localities. There is another thing. There is a conditional allocation to counties. It is for building headquarters of five county governments that did not have buildings in their district headquarters. Mostly, districts became counties. There are some county governments, like Tharaka Nithi, Isiolo, and three more, that never had buildings they could inherit as offices. At that time, in the wisdom of the government, the national Government was to pay approximately Ksh300 million to help these counties. It would be to the tune of Ksh1.8 billion to assist the five counties in getting headquarters. We have gone the long haul and provided around Ksh800 million so far. Some money was to be provided this financial year. Unfortunately, as members can see in the report, this has not been possible because of rationalisation. Some headquarters are at different levels of completion. We hope that will be funded as we proceed. There is an issue we have to look at as a House—fines and royalties. How do fines accrue? When somebody goes to courts in various counties and is fined by county laws, the monies should go to counties because you have contravened county laws. The fines collected by our Judiciary are supposed to go to specific counties, but over the years, this money has not reached the counties as intended. Even in the current financial year, it is only reflected on paper because when the National Treasury comes up with ceilings, each Government department tends to use up its entire allocation without setting aside any portion for the fines to be directed to the counties. As a result, this money remains in the Consolidated Fund. This should be streamlined. For instance, Kwale County is supposed to receive Ksh740 million in royalties from Base Titanium, but there have been challenges because these conditional and additional allocations are budgeted and domiciled in specific departments. For example, funds for health programmes are placed in the health departments. In this Appropriation Bill, the money for health promoters is domiciled in the relevant department. Regarding royalties, the wise thing would have been to domicile this money within mining but that is not provided for. This is because when departments are given ceilings, they first look inwards, in terms of their needs and there is scarcely any other room to accommodate any additional resources for our counties. We need to look into this because there is a gap here. Judging by previous years, this has resulted in the fines money only being accounted for on paper without actually benefiting the counties. Additionally, there are specific funds from development partners, each designated for particular purposes, such as health or climate issues. For example, the Kenya Informal Settlements Improvement Project (KISIP) deals with health programmes while Financing Locally Led Climate Action (FLLoCA) deals with climate issues, support and interventions. When these funds are provided, they come with conditions that must be adhered to. Much of these are concessional, and therefore, cheap but even when borrowing, some conditions must be followed. This forms part of the additional resources that we will appropriate through this Bill today. Finally, there is the County Government Additional Allocation (CGAA), which has included Ksh10 billion for the Roads Maintenance Levy Fund (RMLF) over the past three years. As we were doing the Appropriation Bill, the wisdom of this House was that the maintenance of roads through the Kenya Rural Roads Authority (KeRRA) should be a preserve of the constituency 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."
}