Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 733153,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/733153/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 265,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Maanzo",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2197,
        "legal_name": "Daniel Kitonga Maanzo",
        "slug": "daniel-kitonga-maanzo"
    },
    "content": "team or a commission which cuts across what is happening at the county level and what is happening at the national level. Therefore, oversight has become a challenge generally and that is why this Report was very important to make sure some of the things are streamlined to make devolution a reality in this country now that Kenyans have put it in the Constitution. It is clear there are resources all over the counties which were generated even in the old county councils. If you check, very few county governments have retained those resources. Some of the money is lost. Some of it cannot be accounted for and some is in private accounts. Some counties have fewer resources than what the former county councils had. That has led to inadequate or insufficient funds to fully run all the county activities. There is also inadequate human resource. Although a lot of people have been hired in the counties, it has been a façade. Some of them were retained from the old councils and there are new members of staff. By the time you balance that, most of the money of the counties has gone into hiring. Then, there was lack of regulation to operationalise the particular Act dealing with this. Some county governments have not made serious regulations in recent days as it was expected, even when the Senate gave templates just to fill in like in nursery school. Some of the counties never made that law and you found that regulation was lacking in so many areas which are peculiar to certain counties. For example, in counties in Ukambani, sand is an issue. You could not find regulation to deal with that. With regard to civic education, some counties have tried very much to educate the people. A lot of Kenyans do not know what devolution is. At times, they blame the Member of Parliament or the governor for everything. If they get in touch with the MP, they assume they have communicated to the governor. This is because of lack of civic education. There has been limited appreciation of the concept of intergovernmental relations. That has played out a lot of times. We have even seen it with what is currently happening politically. The role of the President is different from the role of the governor. There is interaction at some point. I believe other than the political heat, there should be a good relationship between the county government and the national Government, so that there can be consultation on a lot of matters. There has also been inadequate capacity in developing legislation which I have already talked about. There have also been cases where the CoG and county governments have hired lawyers who have been paid huge fees on matters which would have probably been settled. Therefore, I support the recommendations and the findings of the Committee, so that we can have better devolution in the country. I support the Motion."
}