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{
    "id": 842513,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/842513/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 131,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Kihika",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13216,
        "legal_name": "Susan Wakarura Kihika",
        "slug": "susan-wakarura-kihika"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Madam Temporary Speaker. I also rise to support this Motion and congratulate the Committee on County Public Accounts and Investment (CPAIC) on the work that they have been doing. However, there is an issue that other Senators have spoken on regarding the timeliness of this Report and I do hope that in the future, we can get the reports on time in order for us to deal with the issues that arise. We are now talking about 2013/2014 and the citizens have probably forgotten what this was about and as we discuss this, we are sort of missing out on what is going on in 2017/2018 and so forth. I would also like to add my voice that it might be good to maybe have the House meet at some point with all the Members in the Committee on CPAIC and, led by the very able Chairperson, Sen. M. Kajwang’, to sort of figure out a way forward as to whether we are going to have many ad hoc Committees that can deal with these reports so as to get to the current year without having to wait for so long to perform our oversight role. Madam Temporary Speaker, looking at the Report on Nakuru County Executive for the Financial Year 2013/2014, the sad thing is that a lot of the issues raised in this Report are still going on at this point. As much as we would have thought that a lot of them were teething issues or they were happening due to the fact that the counties were still being set up, we are probably dealing with a lot of those issues five years later. One of them is under-performance on revenue collection. That seems to be an issue in all the counties. We have to find a way to get revenue collection audited in all the counties, especially Nakuru County, where we have had the amount going down over time, which should not happen. We should be getting more than what we had the previous year and the year before. This has not been the case. Madam Temporary Speaker, when you have revenue collection that is going down and inflated budgets that are based on revenue collection that is not going to materialise, then you have a lot of projects that cannot be completed at the end of the financial year because the money is not there. I am also extremely concerned by the delayed payments of pending contracts. Contractors in the county are complaining that many of them are being auctioned. The bank loans are yielding interest year after year. The counties get money to make these payments yet we continue to have extremely high bills. This needs to be looked into critically and that is why CPAIC should give us these reports in real time for us to keep up with what is going on so as to oversight real time. Madam Temporary Speaker, the bloated workforce, which is a big issue in Nakuru County and seems to be the case in a lot of other counties in the country, is more of a mismanagement issue than anything. You have a County like Nakuru where you hear 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."
}