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{
    "id": 491275,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/491275/?format=api",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "I would like to refer to the Fourth Schedule of the Constitution. This Schedule is extremely important to this Senate because it is what is laid out there that provides us with a lot of work. I must say that we have not done justice to that Schedule. This Schedule deals with the distribution of functions between the national Government and the county governments. Although we know for certain that the functions in that Schedule assigned to the county governments should be performed, there was something that was said when we were implementing the Fifth Schedule. We were advised that the Fourth Schedule should be given a lot of attention. As I said yesterday, the Constitution lays down the general principles and we have to translate them into law. One of the reasons why the counties are fumbling is because they do not know how to implement the Fourth Schedule. In many ways, if we took an audit today to find out how many counties are implementing the Schedule, you will find that they are not paying a lot of attention to some of the most obvious functions like health, land adjudication, liquor licensing and street lighting. I want to draw the attention of the House to the function that relates to the Bill that we will debate after this report. This is on the tenth article in the Fourth Schedule which gives the county governments the following functions:- “Implementation of specific national government policies on natural resources and environmental conservation, including- (a) soil conservation and water conservation and; (b) forestry.” Mr. Speaker, Sir, let me deal with natural resources and environmental conservation. We know that mining is one of the ways of destroying the environment. If there are no specific laws compelling those who mine to make sure that they address environmental problems that they create, we will have a lot of problems I will give you an example; in Kakamega, the county where my dear friend, Sen. (Dr.) Khalwale is the Senator, there was a constituency called Ikolomani. Now, the history of Ikolomani is really a history of mining. The word “Ikolomani” came from the Luhya way of corrupting the word “gold mine” and they called it “Ikolomani.” If you go there, you will find that even up to today, people are still prospecting for gold. They are doing so in my own former constituency, Kisumu Rural, and my county now, Kisumu, at a place called Korwenje, where gold has been mined for many years. It used to be mined commercially and the Wazungus left; but the natives are still continuing to do it. The danger in these areas is that there is no effective policy for environmental control. When these tunnels are dug, they are then covered and the people who come to plant crops do not know where these tunnels are. When it rains, the earth collapses, and it collapses with people, housing and so on, and so forth. It kills a lot of people. This is very dangerous. So, we need a national law that is to be implemented by county governments as specified in this schedule. That means that specific national Government policies on natural resources since both soil and water conservation as well as land and agriculture – all these things related to land – are now county government responsibilities. This law 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."
}