Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 832433,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/832433/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 834,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Ruaraka, ODM",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. T.J. Kajwang’",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2712,
        "legal_name": "Tom Joseph Kajwang'",
        "slug": "kajwang-tom-joseph-francis"
    },
    "content": "I also see several remarks about the National Treasury, especially issues pertaining to disbursement of funds. The Chair of the Committee was a little lenient on the National Treasury. This is a big problem. They do not give us money. They give us money after one year and then they expect us to use that money somehow and take it back to the projects we had programmed. I do not know how they want us to account for those monies. Something needs to be done between the Budget and Appropriations Committee and the NG-CDF Committee. We give them money and they do not give us those monies to be able to run the committees. Something needs to be done. I have seen a lot of recommendations around it but it needs to be stronger because we are the people who budget. We should direct the National Treasury by what time they should be able to supply that money. I am one of those who are affected by asset division. I am in a district called Kasarani, which used to be one constituency that mutated into about four or five constituencies. But when there was asset division and so on, all those things were never passed. We did not know what to do. With the funds that we had, we needed to complete the projects as they were. For example, I allowed my funds to go to everything that was being done before me so that they were all completed. They did not tell us that when we were giving them the money, they were also giving us the debts. Now, we have debts which we did not work for. There are contractors who are on our necks looking for money, but those projects did not occur in the physical place, which turned out to be my constituency. So, I cannot pay because I did not know how those things were arrived at. There should be a recommendation to the board that they isolate some of the issues which were affected by the boundaries so that we understand very well how the assets and liabilities should apply. Some of the contractors are also our constituents. So, when you tell them you cannot pay them, they do not understand you because you are in the physical space in which they worked. So, there is a contradiction. On bursaries and scholarships, it is a very good idea to transfer funds electronically, instead of having cheques to be written physically. In Nairobi, we have one provincial accountant who signs all the cheques for the 17 constituencies. If he is sick, no student will go to school in Nairobi. You can imagine him signing cheques for 1,500 students. Multiply that by 17 constituencies. By the time he has done one day, even his signature has changed. Signatures change when you sign many cheques at the same time. This is a recipe for corruption. He is the main guy there. Everybody must “talk” to him. If you do not “talk” to him, he will be out of office every day. Those are some of the differences we have with rural constituencies. In most rural area districts, you find district accountants signing. In Nairobi, we have one big “god” at Nyayo House who must sign all the cheques. Those are the issues we need to change but the Committee must be involved in the transfers. Otherwise what will happen is once you have the list of students, because the Committee will not go to Nyayo House, is that one can as the Fund Account Manager just put some names just before it goes for electronic transfer. Before you know it, so many other fellows other than your constituents would have received those things. So, it must be done together with the Committee. Let me talk about the Nairobi dynamics. This is where I think I should have spent just two minutes on. Nairobi is different from the local and many other urban constituencies. It is a little different. Here, if you tried using PMCs, they will steal from you. There are people whose jobs are just to steal. They know and have crafted it; that is their job. If you make them PMCs, you will never see them. They will move to other cities. There are things which work in the rural areas where you have the headmaster and the village elder. They are people who are known around. There is nowhere they will go. Here, there are guys who came to do this to make some The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposes only. Acertified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}