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{
    "id": 655484,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/655484/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 480,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Mombasa County has an allocation of Kshs5 billion, Taita-Taveta County has an allocation of Kshs3 billion and Tana River County has been allocated Kshs4 billion. The whole idea of devolution was to ensure that counties get the resources that they were unable to access for a long time. As has been said by my colleagues, if this money is used properly within counties, there must be a transformation. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, at the recently concluded devolution conference, one of the issues that kept coming up over and over again was that of civic education, participation and holding the governors to account. The Senate plays an oversight role, but sometimes we need to put more emphasis and look at the provisions of the County Governments Act by having civic education units within the counties that are able to keep the governor on his toes. We should look at the budgets that the county governments will soon come up with and consider the provisions that they have made in those budgets and the extent to which they adhere to them. Devolution will work because public participation is key as stated in Article 10, which is very explicit. There is correlation between development and public participation. The world over, in countries where there is extensive public participation, deliverables tend to be higher. I, therefore, encourage that public participation should be adhered to. There is provision of Kshs5 billion for public participation within the counties and it should be enhanced across the various counties. I would also like to highlight that we are not yet using the new formula but we have discussed that processes can be put in place for amendments to be made later on. However, I would like to mention that we might want to start a formal or informal process of negotiations so that the National Assembly does not have to stay for the 60 days. If we engage them, there is an easier way to go about it. I am sure that we can have a process that can be expedited so that we move forward. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, we need to ensure that accountability is put in place especially for the conditional grants. Looking through the Bill, I have seen clear conditional grants that have been mentioned, for example, in technical reporting on matters of health; use of District Health Information Software (DHIS) systems and ensuring that the organizations that receive conditional grants have been registered and they have specifications on what exactly to use their money for. Various conditional grants have been given apart from the equal share conditional grants for Level 5 hospitals. Those funds can be used effectively to make a change. There were reports in the newspapers that in Msambweni Hospital in Kwale County, patients are sharing beds with the dead. We need to address such glaring misnomers because the money is there. There is also money that has been allocated for free maternity health care that needs to be utilized so that we do not end up naming children in the way that Sen. Murkomen described, which are meant for people who were born on the way to hospital. The Third Schedule addresses an important aspect of loans and funds from development partners. This is where sometimes we have a grey area. We do not address it as comprehensively as we ought to. We should ensure, for example, that the money that comes from loans and grants is used specifically for what it has been allocated for. In this case, we had organisations like the World Bank and DANIDA financing county health facilities. That needs to be adhered to and followed through to ensure that it is effectively done at every single point; looking through the functions of the devolved governments and ensuring that whatever functions have been devolved and the money allocated for those specific functions is utilized within those specific counties. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. Acertified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}