Entry Instance

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

{
    "id": 263609,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/263609/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 401,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Mungatana",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 185,
        "legal_name": "Danson Buya Mungatana",
        "slug": "danson-mungatana"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. I will also be very brief. First, I want to support the Minister because the Bill is very well drafted. Let us think together. Before this Authority comes into place, there is a procedure for the establishment of the Authority and this is contained at the back of the Bill which is curious because all the Bills we have interrogated here, the procedure is very clear and it is at the front. However, my problem with this procedure for the appointment of the members of the Authority is the inclusion, in the First Schedule, Clause 10 on page 140 which says that the President in consultation with the Prime Minister will extend or may extend the time specified for the activities that need to happen. For example, within 14 days of the commencement of this Act, the Cabinet Secretary is supposed to publish this in the Kenyan Gazette. Now, we are saying that the President in consultation with the Prime Minister can extend the 14 days. Why and we already know that we are late? It also says that under Clause 3, when the panel within seven days of its consultation invites qualified people to start the processes of application and everything, again, the President in consultation with the Prime Minister may decide to extend this period. Why are we giving the two principals opportunity to delay the process that must start and continue to the end? I do not know why we want to tag all the timelines basically, in the process of recruitment. All of them are tagged to consultations between the Prime Minister and the President who may extend the time for what purpose? The Minister has already told us that we are late and we ought to have been carrying out now the profiling of the counties. Let this process go on without the interference of this. I propose that we completely do away with Clause 10. We are comfortable with the way the Minister has handled this matter up to now, the way these Bills have been moved and the competencies within his Ministry. Let us not bring these politicians into this because they will start messing it up. They will also start travelling, going where and they will not meet to consult. We will start having a messy situation. Let the process just proceed without interference. There is Clause 36 and the Minister should listen to this because there is a problem there. It is a small one though. Clause 36 talks about a moratorium. In his submission, he talks about Clause 36 but in the Bill, under the Memorandum of Objects and Reasons, Part 5 of the Bill at the end, talks about Clause 35 talking about the moratorium. That can be messy and we need to flag it off before it is time. However, the point that we need to make in terms of preservation of assets which I want to talk about a little connecting it to Phase I which comes into effect immediately we pass this law. One of the things that the Minister has proposed that we do under this law is to completely have a moratorium under the transfer of assets which is a beautiful proposition so that we avoid people who want to bring about wastage. However, amongst the activities of the transition, which are in Phase I of the transition, there are many things which need to be done which are contained under Clause 1 in the Fourth Schedule on page 144. One of the things I thought is that we need to put a clause here that should compel the local authorities even now to start carrying out inventories. One of the activities that the Transitional Authority is supposed to do is to carry out audit of all the assets. My argument is that we could save sometime if right now we can put it into the law that they should expect this, and that there will be penalties against the treasurers of specific local authorities which will not have carried out proper inventories and kept the records properly so that when the Authority comes and carries out this exercise, this is done without problems. Then there are other activities that are necessary. For example, the Commission on Revenue Allocation is already mandated in the Act that we passed here, that is law now, to facilitate civic education. Why are we loading it again on this Transitional Authority? If we make too many activities on this, then they will move away from the core subject and start spending the money they will be given on other activities that are completely unnecessary. So, let this be done by other bodies. Let them remain professional and keep fixing their eyes on what needs to be done before."
}