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{
    "id": 252742,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/252742/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 193,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Billow",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 260,
        "legal_name": "Billow Adan Kerrow",
        "slug": "billow-kerrow"
    },
    "content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, how satisfactorily can we do that work when we have only one afternoon to go through and understand all those changes, digest them and contribute in terms of scrutinising and approving that expenditure? That is indeed a very tall order for this House and this is the ritual that is being done every year. In my view, this whole concept of Supplementary Estimates, particularly to the tune of Kshs20 billion and so forth, is to undermine this House and difficult to undertake. In the public perception, Members of Parliament are responsible for supervising or overseeing public expenditure, yet we had such a short time for all these hon. Members to go through and contribute effectively and scrutinise. Hence you can understand why they have failed in that responsibility. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, you can understand why this House was unable to detect the billions of shillings that were siphoned through the Goldenberg scandal. You can understand why this House has not been able to detect the billions that have been looted through April 20, 2006 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 615 other corrupt scams that have been unearthed in this country in recent years. When this Government came into power, they said with a lot of fanfare that: \"We have taken over empty coffers\", and yet we have just seen that in the first 12 months of their leadership, they signed contracts worth close to Kshs30 billion in Anglo Leasing security-related contracts. From where did this money come if they claim that they took over empty coffers in 2002? This country has resources and unless we manage them well, we will not be able to develop. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the same Government which has demonstrated monumental failure in detecting and stopping the Anglo Leasing scandal just a few months ago, is today asking us again to approve a further Kshs20 billion. I want to appeal to the Minister for Finance to take his responsibility seriously. We have seen in the report of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that, that Ministry was singularly responsible for the failure that occasioned the loss of the billions of shillings through the Anglo Leasing financing. They have indicated themselves that they abdicated their responsibility by failing to undertake due diligence and many measures that they needed to undertake. In particular, when the Minister stands here and tells us that this House should send a message to the accounting officers that they should not return any money to Treasury, I think he is misleading Kenyans. Treasury is the one that appoints accounting officers. They are the ones responsible for supervising accounting officers. If accounting officers failed to spend the money and discharge their responsibility, the Treasury has powers to withdraw their appointments."
}