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{
    "id": 813437,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/813437/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 181,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Halake",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13184,
        "legal_name": "Abshiro Soka Halake",
        "slug": "abshiro-soka-halake"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir, for giving me the opportunity to support this Bill. The objects of this Bill are clear. Statistics as evidence base for socio- economic development cannot be overstated. For that reason I support this Bill. The more reason I support this Bill is the fact that it gives effect to the mandate of this House which, as stated under Article 96 of the Constitution, is to protect and entrench devolution. Article 174(d) states that one of the objects of devolution of governments is to recognise the right of communities to manage their own affairs and to further their development. Therefore, the County Statistics Bill (Senate Bills No.9 of 2018) provides evidence upon which communities will manage their own affairs because it will be about evidence based policy making at the county level. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, the importance of statistics for evidence based policy making cannot be overstated. Counties need these kinds of statistics to ensure that they are not blindly making policies and that their policies are evidence based. In terms of the role of statistics in planning progress, monitoring and evaluation of development activities, again, this gives effect to our mandate as people who oversight and are stewards of counties and their governments. This House can base its developmental oversight with regard to the basic baseline statistics will form and the mid-term evaluation of our oversight. So, this Bill will give this House a lot of information and tools on which we will base our oversight and evaluate progress of our counties and the nation. The role of statistics in monitoring, developing and maintaining a reliable set of information cannot be overstated. More importantly, what I like about this Bill is the fact that it pushes information and data to the frontlines of decision making which, in this case, are our counties. This is where the counties will have information on which they can make decisions based on information and statistics on where to allocate resources. We have seen in the past that a lot of resources are allocated. However, when you ask for the evidence base that informs the resource allocation, usually it is because somebody up there, it could be the governor or the President---It may be whispered: “It is from above.” Therefore, I like this Bill because it eliminates these whispers around “it is going to be done because it has been said from above” to evidence based because of the gaps and the needs have been identified through scientific methodologies of statistical evidence and data. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, we live in difficult times where our country is plagued by corruption and has below optimal governments. Therefore, this is a good starting point for us to clean house and stop straining the counties for which we are responsible, towards evidence based decision making, policy making, progress evaluation and monitoring towards desired goals and identifying needs as opposed to who you know, which tribe you come from and, therefore, your road or constituency shall get development. This Bill, as I have said before, will bring an evidence base for decision making, having noted previously that the number one driver of corrupt practices is not 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."
}