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"content": "those powers. The County Attorney can delegate some of those powers to officers who are operating under him. It provides that:- “The county government cannot engage the services of a consultant to render any legal services relating to the functions of the County Attorney General.” Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, what used to happen, and I am glad when I became the AG in May, what had been happening before my appointment was that the practice had developed where the accounting officers of the various Ministries on various projects could go ahead, identify and procure the services of somebody to undertake some projects and so on, and actually conclude an agreement without reference at all to the AG. That became a gateway to looting money from the government. The project man, the accounting officer and the advocate hired by that accounting officer may collude with him and the AG is not involved. I am glad that the President of the day stopped that practice and said now all agreements must be approved by the AG. In the last three years before my appointment, that practice had developed. So, no one actually in government knew the agreement that had been entered into by the various accounting officers of the various Ministries. We had to do a check on it. You never knew until something went wrong, and it always went wrong and now the AG was asked to defend them. By that time, if you looked at the agreement, it was so badly drafted that there was no legal basis on which you could challenge whatever had happened. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, we are here saying that the various officials, the Members of the Executive Council, the Chief Officers and so on, cannot go ahead on their own, get some private advocates and enter into agreements without involvement of the County Attorney. If they have to hire somebody, then the County Attorney has to be involved and a normal approval would be on the basis that he is kept informed of what is going on in terms of negotiations by that advocate who has been hired. Before any agreement is concluded, the County Attorney must know and go through that agreement and approve it. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, there is Part 4 which leads to appointment terms and conditions of service of the County Legal Counsel. I do not really have to go into all of that. Apart from the County Attorney, the Deputy County Attorney, all the county legal counsels are appointed by the County Public Service Board. Their terms and conditions are to be set after consultations with the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC). In addition, we have miscellaneous provisions such as giving the power of custody of the public seal of the county to the County Attorney and so on. There is also a section dealing with funds. There is an assurance that this is not a Money Bill. What is important in this draft, which may not have been there before, particularly with the Attorney-General previously, was that there was an oath of office which everybody subscribes to. However, what is important here is that we have a second Schedule; that we have a code of conduct for the county attorney and all officers operating under him; where loyalty, dedication, responsibility, honesty, competence, fairness and diligence are outlined. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, Clause 9 states that the County Legal Counsel shall not be influenced in any manner whatsoever by any individual or body of individuals in 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."
}