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    "id": 1478553,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1478553/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 203,
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    "content": "That is why the Government came up with a strategy to take contracts that were under or in the hands of Chinese contractors in terms of road construction and negotiate with Chinese Government if they could be funded from their money through concessionary loans. There are so many contractors, in fact, the total amount of works, both pending bills and what should be done by Chinese contractors amounts to so much money. The Chinese only agreed to Kshs36 billion and the criteria was that the roads should not be the ones which have graduated or been developed to a certain percentage. I think it was 25 per cent. Those roads which had less than 25 per cent works done are the ones that were onboarded to this facility. So, Sen. Wambua, I might need to check whether Kibwezi-Mutomo-Kitui-Kabati- Migwani Road is part of this. I know that many roads done by Chinese contractors are not in that list, including a road which is in my own constituency. Mr. Speaker, Sir, what is the strategy? I think Sen. (Dr.) Oburu ended by asking me to clearly state how then the other roads would be funded. If the Kshs7 increase in fuel levy fund is allowed to continue, we have a strategy to securitize that amount- because we will be collecting about Kshs30 billion per year, then pay off the pending bills and come to a level where we can budget for additional works. As my final comment, we must go back to the root cause of these pending bills. Why are we starting new roads when the ones that are ongoing have not been completed? We have not been budgeting for road construction properly. For example, for a road requiring Kshs2 billion, once the Ministry of Roads and Transport has Kshs200 million, they start its construction by procuring and awarding. How many years will you need to complete a road of Kshs2 billion by allocating Ksh200 million? Mr. Speaker, Sir, a road which has a pending bill of Kshs513 million is awarded Kshs47 million. You need over 10 years to just pay the pending bills. We must come back to the basics; stop playing politics with road construction in this country and ensure that those road projects which are ongoing are completed. Then, we can start construction of other roads. I end my submission there."
}