Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 1521244,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1521244/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 125,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Kikuyu, UDA",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Kimani Ichung’wah",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Indeed, the Committee and the Ministry officials have gone to great lengths. I listened to what the Chairman and Hon. (Dr) Hon. Nyikal said and agreed with them on all the issues. Many transitional issues need to be addressed. We encourage the SHA management and Ministry officials to ensure these issues are resolved. People should be well-informed in advance on what they need to do. If there is anything that has suffered the negativity we have experienced in the country, it is the SHA. Unfortunately, as you have said several times in other fora, it is sad that even we, the political class, have contributed to this negativity and misinformation. It is especially disheartening when a Member of Parliament stands up at a public forum and says things he knows are for political expediency without knowing whether they are referring to SHA, SHE, SHO or SHU. What they call SHA, SHE, SHO and SHU, as Members of Parliament, whether in this House or the other House, relate to the four laws passed by Members of Parliament in both Houses. There is no single provision in those four laws that was not considered and adopted by this House and the other House. It is, therefore, very embarrassing to hear a Member of Parliament saying \"sha, she, shi, sho, shu,\" yet they were part and parcel of enacting those laws. Leadership calls for what Hon. Nyikal and the Chairman said. There are issues that the Ministry and the SHA management ought to address. Top among these issues is the question of pending bills. If you listen to the conversation in the country on pending bills, you may imagine that pending bills only pertain to SHA. Nobody tells Kenyans that 99 per cent of the pending bills were inherited from the defunct NHIF. Out of the Ksh19 billion inherited from the defunct NHIF, Ksh9 billion had been paid by January. The remaining Ksh10 billion are bills undergoing verification. The Chairman will tell you that from the engagement with the Ministry of Health and the SHA management, quite a number of those bills are fraudulent. Because corruption fights back, the corrupt are so vicious that their lies and propaganda take centre stage ahead of the truth and factual information. If there is anything that the Departmental Committee on Health paid attention to immensely while considering the Supplementary Appropriations Bill, it is to ensure the SHA management has adequate resources to ensure proper information gets to the public. It is embarrassing to see even bishops pontificating on pending bills as if the faith-based hospitals owed by the defunct NHIF just sprung up when SHA came into existence. The bishops are pontificating and telling us not to advertise what the Government is doing. When you are a bishop, you go to church every Sunday to advertise the good work of the Lord by preaching to good people to convert and become good Christians. It is the same for a government. The Government is in the business of delivering services, and our Constitution obligates us to ensure that Kenyans have access to the right information. Some of the people pontificating out there are pained by the truth that even faith-based hospitals presented fraudulent claims, which were flagged out during the verification process. The bishops pontificate to make Kenyans believe that the Government is not doing anything to address the problems that bedevil even the faith-based hospitals. They want to make the whole world believe that since the advent of SHA, no pending bills have been paid, yet 50 per cent of the bills that have been verified have been settled. It is only right to plead to our bishops who run hospitals, as much as they may not like this administration, to give credit where it is due. As you pontificate about the fight against corruption, speak about corruption and fraudulent claims from the defunct NHIF being raised by faith-based hospitals. 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."
}