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{
    "id": 799380,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/799380/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 285,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Omogeni",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13219,
        "legal_name": "Erick Okong'o Mogeni",
        "slug": "erick-okongo-mogeni"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir. We need to take stock. Creating an office of Ombudsman in a county government requires resources. When you allocate resources to running an office of the Ombudsman in a county government, you will be taking away money that could have been used for development in that county. We were here in the morning and I was moved when I heard the report by the CEO of the CRA, that there are places in this country, including Isiolo, where you can get a teacher who has never had access to a mobile handset which we use daily. That we have some parts of this country where it is a dream to talk about clean piped water and that we have places in this country where our women can never dream of getting access to maternity services. We have places in this country where our children can never dream of getting quality education. In this country, we have places where you risk spending days and nights on the roads because of the poor infrastructure of our roads. When we move a Motion in this House saying that we want this important Commission to have presence in all the 47 counties, we should move with caution knowing that we are going to spend more resources that could have been used in provision of services to our people and instead of doing that, we should open regional offices. I am told that the office of the Ombudsman has an office in Mombasa, Kisumu and another region. More importantly, there is debate that is going on within the National Assembly to merge these bodies and there is an agitation which I think that is being spearheaded by the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR). The office of the KNCHR, the Ombudsman and the National Gender and Equality Commission (NGEC)should merge and form one commission. We are doing this initiative because we want to reduce the wage bill that is used by these constitutional commissions. The cry of the Kenyan mwananchi has been - this has been very consistent - that when we enacted this Constitution, we did not do a proper audit of what it will cost the tax man. It has now emerged that they are eating into money that could have been used for development projects in this country. I want to urge my good friend, Sen. Were, to rethink the wording of the Motion so that instead of having these commissions spread in 47 counties, it should probably have presence in the former provincial commissions. We can probably have eight offices because 47 offices will be too costly to the taxman. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate"
}