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{
    "id": 1489964,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1489964/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 109,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Okiya Omtatah",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "cutting here and there. It should have cleaned up that Budget and eliminate budgeted corruption. I can volunteer. The monies which my team and I have isolated is more than Kshs100 billion that are in that Budget. This is much more than what we are trying to cut here, that is being stolen. It is just being put there to be carried away. So, the Committee has recommended a total rejection of what the National Assembly has done. It is my position that we speak in one voice, in a bipartisan manner and make sure that Parliament sets up a special purpose committee to go and look at that Budget, flag out, corruption, and give us a lean and clean budget that will have excess money that can be added to the counties, not what we are having right now. Sen. Osotsi, while contributing, made a very important statement about Article 249(3), which requires this House to participate in the budget-making process specifically as regards constitutional commissions and independent offices. Also, Article 239 of the Constitution on the security institutions, requires Parliament to participate in every aspect of the national security organs and part of it is their budgets. I do not remember seeing the budget of the military or the the police come to the Senate for scrutiny and approval. Article 239 requires that matters concerning national security organs shall be adjudicated by Parliament. As Sen. Osotsi rightly observed, Parliament includes the Senate and the National Assembly. So, there are very many things there. If you go to Article 221 of the Constitution, you will find that the budget of the Parliamentary Service Commission (PSC) is among the budget estimates that are taken to the National Assembly when the budget estimates are being considered. How then does the Senate participate in the budget of Parliament if it is not allowed to participate in the budget-making process? So, the budget of the PSC cannot be adjudicated or determined just by the National Assembly alone. Also, under Article 221, they bring in the budget of the Judiciary. We have got three arms of Government that check each other. How does the Senate participate in checking the Judiciary if we do not look at its budget? So, there are many provisions in the Constitution that require us to participate as a House in the budget-making process. Otherwise, we become irrelevant. Maybe, we should get to a point where we need to look at all the laws that were made after 2013 in terms of public finance. That is where the problem is. The Public Finance Management Act was enacted by the National Assembly alone in 2012. After 2013, many amendments were made that technically took away the powers of this House. For example, there is the question of the CEO of the PSC, whom the Constitution clearly says is the Clerk of the Senate, and the Speaker of the National Assembly is the Chairperson. When you go to the Public Finance Management Act, they decided to create three executives whereby, you have the Clerk of the Senate, the Clerk of the National Assembly and some animal called the Director General of the Joint Services being accounting officers. That has undermined this Senate; we do not have a voice. So, when you go to the PSC, our Clerk, who is supposed to be the final authority, has got no say because he has been undermined through the Public Finance Management The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
}