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"content": "in two hospitals. The machines are seven in total. Why are we paying Kshs200 million? That needs interrogation. Mr. Speaker, Sir, this Senate must come up with criteria and the Chairman did not mention, maybe he forgot. I must say that we have requested the Commission on Revenue Authority (CRA) to give us the policy of interrogating conditional grants. There are so many conditional grants. However, if we are not careful, my fellow colleague, Senators, these conditional grants will take over the functions of counties without necessarily having a mechanism of auditing them. While we appreciate the assistance we are getting from our donors and the work that they are doing in terms of universal healthcare, for example, water and sanitation; we do not know whether governors once this money gets into their kitty, they are mixing it with equitable share and there is no reporting. Mr. Speaker, the Committee led by Sen. (Eng.) Mahamud has achieved a great objective. That objective is to cure the mischief in the last disbursement schedule where equitable share was mixed with conditional grants and because of typographical and mathematical errors, the sharable revenue was not sent. Mr. Speaker, lastly, from a report circulated by the Cabinet Secretary, national Treasury, my fellow colleague, Senators, money is not going to counties. In the last circulated gazette notice by CS national Treasury, 90 per cent of the money that was collected by the national Government went to pay debts. What are we going to do about this issue? The delay in the disbursement of funds even after we have passed them here, it will continue provided our debt is the way it is. Whilst it is a requirement that every month funds are sent to counties, is there a corresponding report to the Senate of the amounts of money sent, for example, to Nandi County? On bank balances, if we do not admit, from the report that I have seen, we will have a crisis. While the National Assembly has today been unable and will not amend or reject the Presidential Memorandum, counties will receive less by Kshs9 billion. Whilst I am sure that the National Assembly will find a way of getting their money back in the National Government Constituency Development Fund (NG-CDF), what strategy do we have, as the Senate, of getting Kshs9 billion back into the kitty of counties? That Kshs9 billion is on development. That money will affect each one of us and each project to the extent – and I discussed this with a fellow Senator – that if we do not check this trend, we will inherit debts in counties. In the end, just like Nairobi City County, these counties will be insolvent. Nairobi City County has a debt of Kshs59 billion and we are remitting Kshs11 billion. In legal terms, that is called insolvency. At the end of the two terms, if we are not careful on these disbursement schedules and the seriousness to which we attach to the monthly remittances, Nakuru County at the end of this session will be bankrupt. There will be nothing to inherit except debts, shells and dry bones. Mr. Speaker, Sir, these are matters that we must discuss seriously if we want to help this country. I have spoken about debts and said that we do not have a portfolio on money bills. However, our colleagues will commit us, by default, to debt. What will we do about it? Under Article 104, we cannot do money Bills, but will we allow them to continue committing counties to debt, while we watch and say that our hands are tied? 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."
}