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"id": 386202,
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"content": "Mr. Speaker, Sir, because of the time element, I just want to focus on two issues: The first one is devolution. I want to talk about devolution because that is our role. I welcome the assurance which the President stated in his speech, and I will quote it:- “That devolution is central to my Government’s vision for Kenya, it is not optional, it is a constitutional duty and one shared by all of us.” Mr. Speaker, Sir, to the extent that he agreed, accepted and admitted that the implementation of devolution is a constitutional duty, I give him a tick. When he was making that statement there were mixed signals which were emanating from the Government which indicated that there were some powerful forces within the Government, and Sen. Murungi, I believe yesterday identified them as partly the Treasury or some Treasury overlords. We know that there are some powerful people who were never happy even during the referendum on the issue of devolution. So, there were those mixed signals coming from the Government. For example, just getting payments to the counties were a problem. In fact, the previous Parliament passed the Transition to County Allocation Revenue Act, which was supposed to implement allocation to each county for the period of March to June this year. According to that Act, this payment was to be effected immediately after elections. That allocation was so good that it was said that it will go directly to the county. For Busia we were allocated Kshs204,893,279. It was even said that it will go directly to the county. But during this period the national Government was supposed to perform some duties on behalf of the county government. So, Busia was supposed to get Kshs3,133,473 for performing those duties. It does appear that although the national Government got theirs, our county governments have not received theirs. So, during the swearing in of Governors and during the inauguration of the County Assembly, the national Government appears to have been in control whereas it is the counties themselves which should have been in control. Mr. Speaker, Sir, another confusing signal is on the issue of County Commissioners. I will be arguing that the use of County Commissioners is in itself very confusing. The commissioner is identified with extreme powers that the provincial and district commissioners had in the past. In that regard, I know, Sen. Haji, who is here, a former provincial commissioner knows what powers he had. There is also Sen. Musila. They know what powers they had. I believe that is why they do not even want to be Governors because Governors do not have as much power as the former provincial commissioners had. That is why they came to the Senate. I hope they will help us to ensure that everything goes on well. Mr. Speaker, Sir, there are a number of laws which are in conflict with the Constitution as far as devolution is concerned, we have to do an audit of all these laws and correct them. One of the things that this House must do is to amend that Act which constituted the county commissioners. We can even change the name to, may be, “national government representative” and avoid the word “commissioner.” We may change the name, like in the majimbo constitution, to be called “agents of the national government in that area.” We have to do that and do it quickly. As long as they are there and they are staying in those houses, there is going to be confusion in the minds of our people about who is who in the county and yet we know that the Governor was elected by the people of that county on one-man-one-vote election. So, the sovereign power of the people was delegated to the Governor. So, the Governor is the political head and whether The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}