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{
    "id": 667847,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/667847/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 58,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Hon. (Ms.) Abdalla",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 382,
        "legal_name": "Amina Ali Abdalla",
        "slug": "amina-abdalla"
    },
    "content": "Supplementary Budget. As a Chair of a Committee who has set up a system to monitor development activities and projects, it has come to our notice that some of the decisions we make on the Supplementary Budgets are not translated back to the implementing agencies on time but, in essence, end up creating new pending bills. Let me give you an example of the First Supplementary Estimates. We reduced the budget of Northern Water Board by Kshs90 million and the Treasury proposed an additional Kshs100 million. So, the House agreed that we will not fund the new project they are suggesting, but fund the existing projects so that we do not end up having pending bills. But that information did not percolate down and so, the implementers started implementing the new projects and not the old ones. In the end, we were giving confusing information back to the implementing agencies because of the short span of time we are giving the review of these Supplementary Estimates. So, as we congratulate Hon. Mutava, we must note that it is a very difficult job to approve things here that we do not have the capacity to check down there, whether they have been implemented. So, these late Supplementary Estimates are causing confusion in implementation that we, as a House, and especially our Budget Office, needs to come up with a process that it will give to the Treasury on the format and timelines so that we do not get confused. I am also concerned about the different interpretations of the Public Finance Management (PFM) Act about the10 per cent changes per budget line. It is Treasury’s view that they look at it as the effect on the overall Budget and not a specific budget line. However, when you change a budget line of any institution by over 30 per cent, it ends up disrupting that institution. That is what had happened in First Supplementary Budget under mining. There was no need to have a ministry if we remove 30 per cent in their budget. So, some of these discrepancies in our interpretation should be ironed out through the amendments to the PFM Act. I want to congratulate the Budget and Appropriations Committee for rejecting Treasury’s recommendation on the transfer of the Kshs4.52 billion from the State Department of Water that was earmarked for the National Irrigation Board (NIB). I would like to urge the Hon. Leader of the Majority Party to look at the fact that NIB financially is under the Ministry of Water and Irrigation but, under our Standing Orders, it is under Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries. The problem is that agriculture deals with activities that are one off. If it is buying fertilizer, they will buy and it will end there. But NIB as an infrastructure institution has projects that require being funded multi-yearly. In the end, when they are housed in a place where things are done annually, their budget allocations and reallocations are done in the manner the Ministry is used to. So, since this is an institution that is infrastructure-related and funds activities multi-yearly, it is inappropriate for NIB to be in the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries. This is the reason why they are suffering and currently are having a pending bill of Kshs4 billion. It is because of the changes that do not appreciate that their budget is multi-yearly. You cannot start doing 100,000 cubic meters of a dam and expect it to end in one financial year. So, I appreciate the fact that despite the fact that we as a Committee did not have the time to comment on this, the Budget and Appropriations Committee has done a good job to appreciate that, that movement would not be an appropriate moment. So, in light of the short time to the end of this financial year, I would join my colleagues in supporting the Budget and Appropriations Committee Report but urge our very competent Budget Office to bring up proposals on amending the PFM Act and give the Treasury a format that would make it easy for us to monitor the implementation of development projects and to give timely Supplementary Estimates. The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}