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{
    "id": 813102,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/813102/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 101,
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    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "on earth? How do you explain the Dongo Kundu Road of 10 kilometres is being constructed at a cost of Kshs11 billion? Even if this road is passing under the water or over the sea, that is open thuggery. Estimates have shown that for you to construct a kilometre of road, you need about Kshs15 million to Kshs28 million. However, some people have formed cartels. When they are asked to bid - it is as if they have agreed - they give a quotation of over Kshs80 million to construct a kilometre of a road. It is totally unacceptable. It is a pity that a footbridge can cost Kshs300 million. How can that be? In the last Parliament, I presented a petition to create a footbridge at the ABC Place along Waiyaki Way. This is a crossway for people with disabilities going to the various organisations on the other side of the road. In my limited estimation, I thought about Kshs20 million would do a good job, at least even to begin. However, that money was diverted because I was told it could do nothing. I fail to understand how at this point in time. we can justify about Kshs300 million being used to construct a footbridge. When you look at Thika Road, most of those footbridges were never constructed. Many people have died because of lack of footbridges. If you are given Kshs300 million to construct a footbridge, you have to weigh whether you need it or do something else. Madam Temporary Speaker, costing of roads is the crux of the matter. That is where we are losing a lot of resources of our country. The financing of these roads is from domestic borrowing. However, mega infrastructural projects are financed through the Eurobond and from the Chinese banks. These are institutions lending money to us at very high interest rates and within a short period of repayment. As a result, we have ended up in a situation where we have not had enough return of investment as to service these loans. Madam Temporary Speaker, if you look at the kind of agreements we have between the Chinese banks like the China Export Import Bank and the World Bank and other the Briton Woods Institutions, who we run away from because of Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs), there is a very good concessionary facility for Kenya under the World Bank where we get loans at 3 per cent over 30 year period under the International Development Alliance (IDA). Kenya is able to benefit from the IDA loans and the lower medium income loans. However, these monies are not corruptible since the uptake is only at 20 per cent for construction of roads and other infrastructural projects. I will not fear to say so on the Floor of this House that because of the kickbacks that Chinese companies give to government officials, their loans become very popular. Let us take an example of Thika Road. What kind of development model is this? You get a loan from the so-called Chinese banks, you couple it with the Government of Kenya money which is Kshs3 billion or Kshs4 billion or thereabouts."
}