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"content": "Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, however, as we adopt the Report, we have to make some few statements; that those who are going to receive the money should understand that money is a very serious commodity. Everyone needs to be extremely careful when using this money, because in a few months to come, we shall come down here again, to pass another disbursement Motion. Before that is done, we want this Committee to be sure that they will have all the information about the activities of the county governments and how they spend their money. At the same time, they should know how much money was there. This time we can forgive the Committee and not demand that they tell us how much money was found by the new system in the Kakamega account. This is because it is a very important matter. I tried sometime ago, before this Committee brought this Report. In the process, the Committee was finding it a bit hard for us to challenge. But I want to tell the Committee that this is a very serious matter and if we are not careful, we are going to devolve corruption in this country. In fact, it was easier in some cases to talk about corruption at high levels. This time, we are going to find this snake called corruption in our hometowns. Therefore, we need to be extremely careful, and this is the responsibility of this Committee. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, if there is a Committee which is going to make devolution work, it is this Committee headed by my friend, Sen. Billow Kerrow. But if we are to fail, they will be responsible for the failure of the devolved government. For example, if Laikipia County is going to receive about Kshs3 billion--- Before the money is disbursed, and the county government has been active, we need to know where they got the money in order to be active. That means that they had a lot of money somewhere, and it needs to be reported here in terms of all the counties individually. The Committee must demand – or we are going to demand through a Motion – to know how much money was found under the new dispensation, for example, in the Kakamega County Council or Siaya County Council account. This is because there is some misconception by some county representatives that they will be sitting there and expecting money to come from the headquarters. I hear that we were not able to make it mandatory that your money will be released if you are able to contribute a certain percentage. If you have 30 per cent in your county or depending on your income capability, you have to raise a certain amount of money from the county and people to be able to get the other disbursement. But we cannot just sit here and decide that this Kshs210 billion will go to counties and then, divide this money “anyhow” because there are some who will benefit more than the others. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, the way the criteria for disbursing the money was determined was not very clear, because there are some counties which are marginalized. For example, Laikipia borders Samburu and Baringo. It is not the people of Laikipia who decided on those boundaries. It was just a decision which was taken somewhere for administrative purposes. Now we are using these administrative purposes for economic consideration. So, I think that the time has come to inform and direct the county governments accordingly. Otherwise, we will be here just to disburse the money because 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."
}