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{
    "id": 742461,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/742461/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 288,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Bunyasi",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2511,
        "legal_name": "John Sakwa Bunyasi",
        "slug": "john-sakwa-bunyasi"
    },
    "content": "desert but do not have these kinds of problems. It is either callousness or I would almost call it incompetence in the planning process. That is pretty saddening. With regard to the other allocations that have been made, we have a perennial problem of our interactions with donors. If you have a donor who can never commit as to how much money they will release until the last month of the fiscal year, there is something wrong with that donor. I do not know which cadre of donor that must be. The ministries must step up and get their work plans clear because that is normally a difficult area. They should get their work plans properly drawn up, negotiated and agreed with donors. They should make sure that they are meeting the conditions on which they must have signed prior to that, including good financial governance. They need to ensure that funds are released in good time and committed firmly in good time for them to enter the budget process so that we know when the money can come and used for what it is intended to do. One of the adjustments that have been made in the Supplementary Budget is on irrigation. Irrigation has almost become a joke in this country. You know how irrigation was treated. We had the 1 million acre scheme that ended up being 5,000 acres with no more than 20,000 bags or tonnes, if it was that much at all and many billions down the drain. It was nearly Kshs9 billion down the drain from the numbers that were given earlier. These just look like schemes for people to sort of draw money. I hope that the Departmental Committee on Agriculture, Livestock and Cooperatives has looked critically at the budget use in the irrigation sub-sector of this country. When I see numbers that are relatively small such Kshs100 million here or Kshs500 million there, we do not know what the outcome of those funds would be. We are in a year where there is not only famine but hunger. I come from Nambale and as I walk around communities there is a lot of stress. They have gone through a long dry spell. The crops are still in the field. The harvest is coming in another month or two. There has been a lot of hunger. There is a lot of money being thrown around and there are people either dying at the extreme or actually going through enormous hunger strain. These allocations of funds - throwing money without telling us how the problems are going to be resolved - is simply trying to finance people’s needs at a time like this, particularly in an election cycle. The methods of how to do this are well-known. People must know how money in irrigation is being used or misused and I think it is being misused. The reports that came out last year are scary. When I see additional money being thrown at it, it really bothers me. I am saddened by the supplementary allocations that have been made. I do not think that they are addressing the problem. I think they are throwing money at the problem at a time when funds will be used in these three weeks through fictitious spending bills as it has happened before where monies simply go into a bottomless pit to finance various needs, including the needs of an election year. This third Supplementary Budget is unfortunate, in my view. It is something that should have come out of prior planning and thinking. I know that Kenya has a strong capacity in planning. We have had it for over 40 years. I see no reason why we have these knee-jerk reactions at the end of the year with large sums of money that we do not know where they will go. Overall, I do not support this Supplementary Budget allocation because it has been done in a hurried manner that is supposed to finance patronage."
}