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{
    "id": 609897,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/609897/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 49,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "This is not the way to make the Budget. It is unacceptable. I think our Members were penny wise and pound foolish. This means that you are worried about the little pennies you give to the Senators and you ignore the Kshs283 billion you have given to the Governors that needs to be examined. It is a pity. I want to urge my friend the Speaker of the National that this is his legacy that is on trial. He needs to check the excesses in some of these institutions like the the Budget and Appropriations Committee and the other committees because we run a risk. If today the media can report what is going on in committees and already in his House two of the most important committees are being investigated by the EACC, it is an indictment of the performance of that institution and he needs to do something. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, with regard to the Executive, we cannot allow circumvention or subversion of the Constitution. For example, the Public Audit Bill was passed by the National Assembly, it was sent to this House, we made amendments, they rejected and we went to the Mediation Committee. After the Mediation, that Bill has now been returned back to the National Assembly by the Executive with some amendments. To make the matter worse, Treasury has sat down and proposed a whole lot of fresh amendments. It is like writing the Bill afresh. The financial powers and the functional independence of the Auditor-General has literally been taken away to the 1963 level in the proposed amendment. The reason I am saying that it is subversion of the Constitution is because it will be sent to the National Assembly. Since they cannot raise the two-thirds to reject the President’s Memorandum, it will automatically be approved. In other words, the Executive is now making the law. This House which has the power in the Constitution, which represents the sovereignty of the people of Kenya, will not be making laws. Before even that story happened it was carried in the media when the Mediation Committee was sitting. It was carried extensively in the media because it was debated in the House of the National Assembly; that what they will do is to allow whatever the Senate wants, let it go there and come back and when it comes back, it will now pass without any amendments. This is not acceptable. What shall we be doing here if the Executive can make laws? Why are these Houses created by the Constitution? We need to appreciate the role of every institution. We must entrench constitutionalism and allow this county to be governed properly because lack of good governance is what made this country collapse for many years and made us be behind so many countries all these years. It is important that we do so. With those few remarks, I support."
}