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{
    "id": 58795,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/58795/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 156,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Orengo",
    "speaker_title": "The Minister for Lands",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 129,
        "legal_name": "Aggrey James Orengo",
        "slug": "james-orengo"
    },
    "content": " Mr. Speaker, Sir, I quite agree, but that is because there is limited time. One of the things that may be an indicator as to whether we are losing revenue or not or people are afraid is whether revenue collection in the Ministry has gone down. In fact, it has gone up. Even in this financial year, it continues to go up. The second thing which has happened particularly for banks, they are now reading the conditions of these leases. For example, there are people who know where there is vacant public land and apply for it. They get allocations and the first thing they do is to look for somebody to sell it to and yet the conditions of the lease states specifically that if you are given public land, you must use if for that particular purpose. If it is for building, for example, business premises, you must do it. You cannot mortgage or sell it. So, what we have found out even with the banks, they are now reading very carefully the conditions of lease. I think the public is very much aware that buying public land as a second buyer is an extremely risky business and they are all the time watching out and finding out clearly what is the status of that land. Mr. Speaker, Sir, we had better be serious about this if we want to be legally advised and so on and be making public land cheaply available for investors. I want to give an example. There is an instance where public land near the NSSF Building was given to individuals. The first thing they did with it was to borrow Kshs200 million on it, which accrued an interest of Kshs600 million. Ten years down the line, the same individuals were negotiating with the Government to buy the same land from them for Kshs1.5 billion. Surely, if we are going to deal with public land in those kinds of circumstances, then we will never be able to have land available for investors in Kenya. We have done a lot of public education on---"
}