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{
    "id": 1570387,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1570387/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 278,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Mandago",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "needs Kshs1,000 to go to hospital to deliver, will you say that is not part of your duty or you will have to find a way of giving that mother the Kshs1,000 to be able to go to the facility? That is what our MCAs go through every day. If we want to strengthen accountability in counties, so that when we send resources the primary level of oversight is properly conducted, then we must empower the county assemblies. I must thank this Senate for giving them autonomy. We must now also give them the financial capacity to be able to do that. Madam Temporary Speaker, I know the courts have pronounced themselves in the matters of qualification. As is now in this country, it is only the governors who are required to hold a degree. The rest of the positions, as long as you are a Kenya citizen with a birth certificate, it is sufficient for you to become a leader. We do not dispute that you do not have to have degrees to be a leader. However, I think we need to put some bare minimum in some functions. For example, for you to be the chairperson of finance and budget committee in the county assembly, there is need for us to put some qualification there. This is because it requires capacity, to even internalize and check the figures that are being given by the executive and to be able to interrogate the audit reports from the Auditor-General. There is need for some specific qualification, for some specific jobs, so that we can improve on our accountability. Finally, there are still a lot of resources that have been left in some state departments that still continue to perform their functions. As a House, we must continue to reign on these state departments and make sure that these functions are fully devolved and that resources follow functions. As I speak, I have two state departments in my mind; the State Department of Health and the State Department of Agriculture. If you look at those two functions, they are about 95 per cent devolved. In health, the 47 county governments are dealing with close to 14,000 health facilities. The national Government through the State Department of Health is dealing with less than 50. If you look at the functions that are being run by the Ministry like malaria control, distribution of nets, for instance, does not require anybody to go to school. In fact, that is a function that should be done by our Community Health Promoters (CHPs). Now that we have a number of them across our counties, and they are even more distributed than the health workers, they are in a better position to perform the preventive activities of health. However, you will still find they are also responsible for distribution of nets in the Ministry. The function of nets is still in the Ministry. Functions like teaching and sensitizing the general population on washing hands is still domiciled at the Ministry. The Ministry officials want to still travel across the country to sensitize people now to wash their hands. On oral health, money is being spent at the State Department of Health to teach people on how to brush their teeth, something we used to be taught by our teachers and a few public health officers across those times. Why is this money still in the Ministry of Health? We need that money to go to county governments. We also need to strengthen accountability in county governments. The lazy excuse that has been used all the time of saying, “oh, there is corruption in our counties, corruption has been devolved.” If we are to do consolidated values of"
}