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{
"id": 17314,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/17314/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Kimunya",
"speaker_title": "The Minister for Transport",
"speaker": {
"id": 174,
"legal_name": "Amos Muhinga Kimunya",
"slug": "amos-kimunya"
},
"content": " Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I thank you for giving me this opportunity to support the Finance Bill. I believe that it is self-evident in terms of the need for support. Therefore, I do not want to belabour the points that have been made except to just mention one or two things, especially because one of them has been raised by an hon. Member. It is linked to the issue of tempering with registration systems of vehicles. Hon. Mungatana also raised issues in the area of insurance. I would like to add my voice on those issues. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I will start with the issue of insurance because it is something we keep on getting every day. I would like to urge the House to look at it from the point of view that we, as a country, are seen to be a region where the cost of doing business is increasing by the day. You need to look at the number of licences and the monies that people need to pay to comply with the law, and look at our labour laws and the high salaries that we need to pay. Real estate prices are quite high. Rents are getting high, and we are becoming uncompetitive vis-a-vis the rest of the region. So, even as we think that, perhaps, insurance companies need to pay more in terms fees, we need to also factor that into account. As we charge them more, we could drive them out of business or force them to concentrate their operations in Nairobi without ever having to see the need for expanding into the counties. A higher fee is punitive to the business that wants to expand and move into the counties. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I thought of raising that because I know Mr. Mungatana is very passionate about devolution as a concept and wanting to see more operations in the counties. The only way we will attract businesses into the counties is by ensuring that the establishment costs as they move out of Nairobi are actually far much cheaper. This is the only way people will see that it is easier to open branches outside and operate from there because you pay lesser fees than paying high fees in Nairobi. I would like to see it from that perspective. I would have gone for a reduction from Kshs20,000 so that people can open those offices in the counties. That is where we want to create employment and move people rather than the reverse where you force people to pay more. It means they will remain in Nairobi and they will never see the point of going outside because it is punitive to do so. The other thing I wanted to share with this House, and I am very happy that it is now coming within this Finance Bill, is that we need to have these deterrents on tampering with our registration systems of the vehicles. This tampering takes effect in different ways. You will find somebody who imports high end sports utility vehicles, but because of the duty implications, they end up registering or declaring them as tuk tuks, meaning those three wheelers. They will also register them as tractors which have a different duty implication. They are then registered and then through tampering with the records they then end up having that log book changed, but they have the number plates. We have taken different approaches to this. Just yesterday we did launch new number plates for these three wheeler tuk tuks, tractors, higher commercial machinery and we should not forget that motor cycles too have a new type of number plate. We do not want people to take advantage of one category of vehicles and avoid paying duty. I do agree with Mr. Mungatana that we should have very heavy penalties. We have also taken administrative measures now to ensure that people do not actually get those numbers. We may wish to consider at the Committee Stage whether it is worth enhancing or whether the administration measures will also deter the people while we also have the US$10,000 equivalent at that point as a fine for people tampering with those systems. I do agree that it is a very serious offence and it has cost the Exchequer quite a bit of money as people fiddle around with the registration of vehicles. The good thing is also that, and I would want to share this with the House at an appropriate time, we will be tabling in this House these measures in terms of the integrated management system on vehicles. We are coming up with a system that will help track a vehicle from the time it enters Kenya. We will be able to track it from the time it leaves the factory, when it is first registered to the time it is actually retired – it is a whole process. People can access all the information from different angles. Just through a short text message, you will be able to see the status of the vehicle. Anyone buying a vehicle can SMS and be able to see whether the person who is selling the vehicle is actually the owner and that kind of thing. That is coming very soon. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, as I come to a close, I was amused this morning when somebody called me to find out whether I had seen my picture in one of our newspapers. He told me there was a big story on the printing of currency and there were pictures of the former Minister for Finance, Mr. David Mwiraria and the Minister for Transport. He was wondering whether currency printing has now moved to the Ministry of Transport. Let the newspapers sometimes amuse themselves. If it will boost their sales, I do not have a quarrel with them. I will not sue them because it helps boost their sales. I hope that they sold more today because they included my photograph in a story that was not related at all to what I do. I was very amused and I just wanted to share that amusement with the House. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, as I said, the Bill is self evident in terms of its contents. I do not want to belabour the point further. I beg to support."
}