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{
    "id": 682078,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/682078/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 272,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Ogolla",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1264,
        "legal_name": "Gideon Ochanda Ogolla",
        "slug": "gideon-ochanda-ogolla"
    },
    "content": "Similarly, if you look at the portfolio of Government in the GDP of the country, you realise that it is less than a third; meaning that over two-thirds is basically in the private hands or private persons in this country. So, when we talk about volumes of bribery and volumes of corruption in the country, if it is 100 per cent, then definitely over 70 per cent is contributed to by either individuals or private persons in their capacities either as they deal with the Government or in their capacities as they deal among themselves to an extent that this Bill really brings out something that has not been clearly looked at; the private person, the private hand in the whole scenario of corruption in the country. I support this Bill largely based on two things. First, it has extended focus to the private persons in terms of the processes that we look at when dealing with issues of corruption. The second one is the element of reporting. Looking at both the issue of focus on the private persons or entities and that of reporting, we have realized over a period of time that reporting cases of crime or being a witness in this country has been very expensive. In as much as the Bill still talks about the witness protection programme or protection of whistle-blowers, the process of administering that is still fairly cumbersome and expensive such that it has been too expensive for one to be a witness in this country even in terms of ordinary cases in court. You sometimes have to appear on your own and bear the cost of being a witness. You have to do all manner of things plus expend your time and resources. Many people are constantly not able to be witnesses even when crimes are committed in their own sight. This is an important area that we still need to look at to see what it is. Is the issue just being a witness or are there also costs that are attendant to you being a witness in terms of resource and time? Could we talk about some elements of compensation? Could we talk about facilitation for whistle-blowers; not just protecting them against the people they are reporting about, but also protecting them in terms of the cost and time? That is how you encourage individuals to report incidents of corruption. Like I mentioned earlier, there are people who deal with the Government such as service providers and contractors. You normally hear talk about the Government constructing a road, but it is actually the private contractors who have constructed the road. The Government contracts out the service. The quality of the works and material are never looked at in terms of the time span of the construction of the road. Roads, sometimes, look very beautiful on the face of it. However, we have never come up with clear standards that if a road is done to this kind of level, it should last for 15 or 20 years. Nobody adheres to this. By the end of the day, the Government has facilitated an environment where some of those private contractors have thrived with regard to issues of bribery and corruption. As we discuss this Bill, it is important that we look at these areas much more appropriately."
}