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{
    "id": 852782,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/852782/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 455,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Cheruiyot",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13165,
        "legal_name": "Aaron Kipkirui Cheruiyot",
        "slug": "aaron-cheruiyot"
    },
    "content": "that are being added to The County Allocation of Revenue Act, have been allocated. What was of concern to them was our stand, as the Committee on Finance and Budget, on the issues that they were reading in the media about governors buying palatial homes and billions of money being looted in our counties. They engaged us for about 15 minutes. We realized that there is a growing sense of desperation amongst our population. I want to propose that during the long recess, the Senate Business Committee should rack its brain and think through our organization and the speed with which we are looking into audited books of accounts for our counties. We are still considering the 2014/2015 Financial Year. What audacity or courage can one have, as the Senator of a particular county, to go and say: “I am the person charged with the responsibility of providing oversight for the funds that are being sent to my county?” It is something that we should be careful with, especially now that we have politics going round about the Senate being a toothless dog that people can easily do away with. I sometimes think that we are shooting ourselves in the foot by not coming out strongly. That is why when I was making my contribution earlier on to the Report that we were debating, I asked the County Public Accounts and Investments Committee (CPAIC) to give us a detailed report, like what they did for Ruaraka. They need to point out where the errors are when handling reports of audited accounts from our counties. It is no longer an issue of CPAIC. The time has come for us to question the whole organization and whether it is prudent for us, as a House of oversight, to charge the responsibility to a group of five to 10 Senators and ask them to take charge. This is work that we should divide amongst all the 47 delegations that are in this House. I should be able to sit in the Committee that reads through the audited accounts of Kericho County, so that when I stand in a public baraza in Kericho, I know what I am speaking about. I should not just go before the Committee as a friend on the day when they have invited the governor. I should be able to interact with the report that is being brought. I look at a county government as a company, where the governor is the chief executive officer and the Senator is the chair of the board. The Senator is the person charged with the responsibility of giving strategic direction and ensuring that the person who has the accounting powers spends the money on what it was meant for. If you set an exam in this House and ask each of our 47 Senators to give you a breakdown of the financial year that ended in 2017, how many can tell you the resource allocation to their counties? How many of them can tell you how much money their counties collected in terms of revenue, what the expenditure on remuneration was and how much went to actual development or in acquiring of assets, and yet that is a simple breakdown that any person running a business can tell you? Even mama mboga running a kiosk can tell you what it costs to run and operate her business. Unfortunately, for us Senators, we have not risen to that level; to know that we are charged with the responsibility. Some 20 to 30 years from now, when we will be in our counties as retired politicians, people will want to know what some of these grants and debts that are being accrued by counties did. We should be able to provide the answer and do it accurately and justifiably. We should tell them that they are paying a certain amount of money because, at that time, the money was used to equip the local referral hospital or conserve the forest, like the grants that are being given here will do. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}