Entry Instance

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

{
    "id": 893897,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/893897/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 289,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Sakaja",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13131,
        "legal_name": "Johnson Arthur Sakaja",
        "slug": "johnson-arthur-sakaja"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Madam Temporary Speaker, for the opportunity to support the Bill on the County Oversight and Accountability Bill (Senate Bills No. 28 of 2018). The Senator who has proposed this Bill, Sen. Olekina, is fast rising to get into the history books as one of the most effective legislators. He is my junior, legislatively, because this is a House that acknowledges seniority based on the terms that one has served. I advise him to keep at it. He should keep moving towards that direction. Kenyans are beginning to see him as a beacon of hope in a Parliament that is filled with complacency. I watched him yesterday, on television; passionately talk about the Ruaraka Report, which I happened to have the honour or the dishonour of being the only Member from this side of the aisle who supported it. I supported it because it was a matter in Nairobi and it was also a matter of integrity, conscious and it was guaranteeing our children a future in schools. Thank you so much, Sen. Olekina. When you look at this Bill, there is a lot of creativity and thought that has been put in it. It is about the fulfilment of our cardinal function in this House, which is oversight of county governments, public purse and monies that are sent for development and growth of this country. Next year will mark 10 year anniversary of the Constitution of Kenya and I hope that Kenyans will stop calling it the new Constitution. In many of our cultures, a 10 year old is not called a new born. The outstanding factor of our Constitution is the expansive bill or rights. Other nations have noted our Constitution because of the shift from a deeply centralised system to one of fiscal decentralisation where we have sent power and resources to counties through devolution. Devolution is the shining arm of our Constitution. It is the cherry on the cake and it is what made Kenyans to overwhelmingly support this Constitution. This Constitution brought a ray of hope to the areas that had been left to the back-burner of development in this country. We had some regions that had never seen tarmacked roads, hospitals and had no hope of getting water for their children. They now had the hope that every part of this country would get their equitable share of the national cake and that everybody would be able to thrive. It is because of that reason that we all went to the ballot in 2010 to vote in this Constitution. A hallmark of this Constitution is Article 10 that talks about values and principles. The previous Constitution was very light on values, principles and philosophy but this Constitution talked about it. One of the biggest points in Article 10 is Public participation. You cannot have oversight without the participation of the public. It is sad that in as much as those who had fallen back have started crawling and walking with feeble limbs, some of the areas that were doing well are now doing badly. Sen. M. Kajwang’, who is the only Member in the Chamber who is serving his second term, will remember that many of our town councils and municipal councils were collecting more revenue in proportion to what the budgets were than the successive county governments. That begs a lot of questions. Did we devolve inefficiencies and corruption or what is happening? Nairobi County was cleaner under Mr. Gakuo and Mr. 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."
}