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{
    "id": 853041,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/853041/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 196,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Kipkelion East, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Joseph Limo",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1915,
        "legal_name": "Joseph Kirui Limo",
        "slug": "joseph-kirui-limo"
    },
    "content": "In all these forums, most of the stakeholders made presentations which were varying in nature. One thing which every representative of these organisations supported is that the county assemblies and executives or the county governments must have a coordinated pension scheme. It is conventional for every organisation to indicate in an appointment letter the terms and conditions of service, including but not limited to the fact that one will be a member of a specific pension scheme upon being confirmed permanent and pensionable. Unfortunately, almost all the county governments in Kenya do not have the leeway of indicating that an employee will be a member of a county pension scheme or county retirement scheme. It is because there is no standard scheme in place. As I stated earlier, the county governments give employees an option of joining the LAPFUND, which was a creation of an Act of Parliament. It is recruiting members from all the counties, depending on employees’ preferences. The other one is popularly known as the County Pensions Fund (CPF). This was a creation of Local Authorities Pensions Trust (LAPTRUST). Therefore, in their view, every stakeholder indicated that it will be appropriate if we could have a pension scheme for county assemblies and county executive. This will make it easy for the county assemblies and county governments to indicate when they are employing so that they have a coordinated way of getting pension. I want to state very clearly that it is important to have a very good pension scheme for employees in this country. It is actually difficult that when you retire you do not have pension. Among the stakeholders who appeared before us, though they were not relevant for this particular Bill, were the former councillors. The former councillors are really suffering because they did not get even a single cent when they were leaving office. They are not getting any payment currently. There is a belief by the scholars that there is something which is called the agony of retirement. The agony of retirement means that when someone retires, within the first five years, they will be seeing their savings depleting but there is nothing coming every month. So, it is important to have something to hold on to when they retire. I will therefore urge this House to consider and ensure that there is a coordinated pension scheme for the workers. I want to reiterate the point which some Members had indicated here. Why are we having confusion? The same confusion we saw during public participation…"
}