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{
    "id": 545679,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/545679/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 153,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Lati",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2762,
        "legal_name": "Jonathan Lelelit Lati",
        "slug": "jonathan-lelelit-lati"
    },
    "content": "country Kenya. Artificial insemination and research are some of the things we tend to fund as a country. The biggest element and the biggest contributor of our livestock Gross Domestic Product (GDP) today is the livestock kept by the pastoralists in northern Kenya, but we put nothing in terms of research and marketing. We tend to forget that all the meat we eat in all these markets, up market restaurants and small markets in Nairobi come from some places like Samburu. It is time we started considering those marginalised areas in terms of livestock funding because that is where most of our livestock come from. Hon. Speaker, it is also important to note that for any budget, we should state clearly where we are getting money to fund it. The Supplementary Budget we have in front of us does not in any way state where the money is coming from. We tend to think that money will fall from the skies and it does not. We either get money by taxing Kenyans which is revenue or we get money by asking for debts from other sources, for example, external funding by partners. I suspect that without the partners and without revenue, the Supplementary Budget is taking us a hole deeper into the death of this Kenya. We know that is something we will pay for many years as Kenyans and our children will continue to pay. Hon. Speaker, what the Ministry needs to take into account is look at the absorption rate. As we talk today on the Supplementary Budget, yes there are Ministries that require money and that is very important. We need to fund them because if you consider things like security operations, they need money. But as we talk today, there are Ministries that are sitting with money and budgets that they cannot absorb. We should find a way as Kenyans to move this money around. If you are not absorbing money, why would we bring a Supplementary Budget? We should take away money from you and give it to someone within the same Government serving the same people of Kenya who need it, particularly on areas of security. There is also another element in this Supplementary Budget that is tiring to Kenyans-the issue of restructuring of Government corporations. I am a free marketer and I have always had this idea that Government should get out of business and let the private sector do the business. As things are now, the Government is in business in some areas that are not even strategic in any sense. We are still funding things like Telkom and for so many years, we keep pumping money into these corporations. The people concerned need to fast track privatisation and restructuring so that Government corporations become profitable and stop being liabilities to the people of Kenya. Thank you, hon. Speaker."
}