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"content": "(Mr. Omingo): Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I wanted to give an example of the situation where I come from. I thank you because speaking from here makes me much more clearer. I am also vertically challenged and that was giving me a bit of a problem. I started by saying that I wanted to thank His Excellency the President and the Prime Minister for having set up a Grand Coalition Government. I am happy to be part of it. I know that most of my supporters and the Kenyan youth expected more than what they got. However, because even the Prime Minister did not get the first prize, in the interest of the nation and magnamity, we need to give and take. Most important, we say that this country is bigger than all of us. However, most of us do not live that statement. We only say it by word of mouth. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I am proud to say to the people of South Mugirango, whom I represent, that with regard to the Grand Coalition Government, we are where we are in the interest of healing our nation. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, Kenya is a rich country. I am looking forward to the day when all Kenyans will look at this country as one which is incorporated for the social well-being of all Kenyans. You do not have to pick money from Government coffers as a Minister or Permanent Secretary. That can be compared to a grown African man stealing from his own house. That is the Kenyan taxpayers money. I think we have to address the issue of morality. I equate an adult African man who steals from the Government, either as a Minister or a Permanent Secretary, to a man who steals from himself by removing money from one pocket and putting in the other and runs away as if he has actually stolen the money! In my experience as the PAC Chairman, I learnt in Uganda, that exposure as you deliberate on the PAC issues, is a deterrent feature in line with what we expect to do so that people do not practise corrupt deals. In Uganda, the Chairman of the PAC sits with his teammates alongside members of the Intelligence System so that whenever evidence is given to the extent that somebody suspiciously entered into a deal, he is arrested and taken to court directly. Here, the process is too lengthy. When we recommend that the Attorney-General takes action, nothing happens. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, when I say that Kenya is a rich country, it is indeed, a rich nation. It is rich because Kenya, as a mother, gives us beautiful children round the year in terms of wonderful coastal beaches and tourism income. However, the country is corrupt. I call it a plague. Mother Kenya has been ripped off and raped over time. It is for this reason that I, as an Assistant Minister of Government, waited very patiently to have an extreme overhaul of our systems and structures of Government to address the issue of wastage of Government resources that has cost us untold suffering. I know that Kshs750 billion in public debt that was being serviced in the year 2003 was as a result of public wastage of resources. We must be ashamed of ourselves. It pains me that the same people--- However, in the spirit of healing, let me not reiterate this. It pains us that \"great\" Kenyans who have ripped off the resources of this country are rewarded with promotions and good jobs. It is high time that, even as we get people to be elected to this House, we put them through some means April 29, 2008 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 735 test. We must know if they are living beyond their means. Did they earn what they have or they stole from other people? We are perpetrating these characteristics because we also quicken theft by bringing those people back and recycling them in this House in the name of democracy. I thought we had grown beyond that. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I want to undertake that as we vouch forward in terms of building a new Kenya, and being for the first time associated with the Government, that I will not keep quiet if wrongs are done. History will judge us very harshly because we are here as leaders of this nation and should not be sitting on corrupt deals. We should not allow money to be taken out of public coffers. It is high time that we searched our souls and enlightened our electorate. We should live by example. It is important to leave by example because that way, there is something for our children to be proud of. It is painful, in the African context, when you find in African leadership that nobody wants to leave power when he is strong enough to live an extra year or more. The reason is that all of us want to eat and steal. We do not want to leave office and be audited. We do not want to reflect on our history because it is terribly dirty. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I am looking forward to a day when great Kenyans will retire from public office with their heads high, like the late Mwalimu Nyerere, without fearing being haunted by their dirty history. For the purpose of healing this nation, we are all in the Grand Coalition. However, let us not sit back and watch wastage going on in our midst. We all know that, for many years, Ministries have been receiving some donor funding. When I served as a Member of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), most of technocrats in Ministries could not account for the donor money. They would tell us they were unable to utilise the training funds because they could not identify trainers and trainees. This is a very simple and basic thing that could be done by anybody. However, if there was money available for procurement, it could have been spent immediately because of the kickbacks involved. We could not understand why money supposed to be spent on service delivery was not utilised. How could they have not identified the trainers and trainees. It is pathetic as it is. The PAC will be wasting its energy and time of this House, if recommendations contained in these reports are not implemented. We need now to move from historical audit to value for money audit. Mr. Kimunya, who is my senior colleague, knows that world over, governments are moving from historical postmortem issues to value for money audits. We are now discussing the Reports of 2002/2003 and 2003/2004, but we claim to be very current. Those who \"ate\" in 2004, are long dead and buried. We cannot even trace their estates because their money came easy and went easy. It is high time we stopped looking at a postmortem, because the body is rotten and we only remain with dry bones to examine. However scientific we are, we cannot achieve anything. We should do value for money audit. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, Treasury has been resisting to computerise their operations. We need to advise each other because a friend is one who says the truth when things go wrong. They have been resisting computerisation because of the audit trail effects and instantaneous reflection of the deals. They are comfortable dealing with papers which can be destroyed."
}