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{
    "id": 814985,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/814985/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 130,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "through the Council of Governors (CoG). We are then telling Kenyans that we want them to be food secure; that we will provide ways and means of producing that food, yet we are centralizing this thing, and therefore, putting it far from farmers. We are creating bureaucracies that farmers can never be able to manage. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, Part IV of this Bill addresses the responsibility of the county governments. It states that county governments should establish county irrigation development units for irrigation. This is what we have had in the existing National Irrigation Board (NIB), which is being replaced in this Bill. We are now bringing in the Irrigation Bill to centralize these things and only create a nominal unit at the county level. When will counties ever have the capacity to do their own things? When will counties develop the wherewithal, including technicians for handling very simple things like water resource management? There is already an existing Authority which we should use to educate and elevate the activities in county governments. Therefore, the responsibility of county governments cannot be reduced to a mere unit trying to perform a very important and central function of irrigation within counties. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, Part IV, Clause 14(3)(c) states that- “The county irrigation development units established under subsection (1) shall have the following functions— c) identify community-based smallholder schemes for implementation in line with national guidelines;” This means that it is already marginalized, yet you are coming back here, putting in very nice clauses that you are going to identify the smallholder, when the center of decision making has already been centralized at the national level. Where is he going to have the voice? He has no voice anywhere. You are just telling him that it is nice, that we have catered for you in the Bill, yet the actual decision-making process is elsewhere. Therefore, this is a very misleading Clause in this Bill. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, Clause 14(3)(e) states that: “The county irrigation development units established under subsection (1) shall have the following functions— provide capacity building for farmers and support establishment of viable farmer organizations, and in particular, irrigation water users associations to develop and manage irrigation schemes including actively participating in conflicts resolution within irrigation schemes”. The farmers being referred to here are not involved in the decision-making process because the reporting center is the Irrigation Authority, the Cabinet Secretary and then the Cabinet. The next thing they will see is that they will be given orders on what to do yet there has been no input whatsoever from that farmer. I do not think we should go that way. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, Clause 15(2)(b) in Part V on the irrigation services states that- “Pursuant to subsection (1), the Cabinet Secretary shall take measures to— 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."
}