Entry Instance

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

{
    "id": 900259,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/900259/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 171,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Bomet Central, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Ronald Tonui",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1242,
        "legal_name": "Ronald Kiprotich Tonui",
        "slug": "ronald-kiprotich-tonui"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Speaker for this opportunity to add my voice to this. I want to make it clear that I support the position of the Senate 100 per cent. As a House, we have never agreed on a position with regard to this Bill. We always embrace whatever is forwarded by the Executive to this House without thorough scrutiny of the same. The idea of adding Kshs20 billion to the counties under this Division of Revenue Bill is quite welcome. The key functions in the Constitution are devolved. Issues of water services, access roads and agriculture are devolved. Those are the key functions which touch the common man. Those are the most well-funded. We also have an issue where resources remain in the national Government, especially in the Ministry of Health, where majority of those services are provided in the counties. In the national Government, there are only four hospitals funded with over Kshs70 billion which we let lie idle in the Ministry of Health. That is why the Ministry of Health is able to misuse those funds by buying unnecessary items like the containers which are rotting in Mombasa and have been there for five years. We are defending that so that we have idle funds lying there. I was in the 11th Parliament when we approved the issue of leased medical equipment. We were misled because we were fighting the courts and the Jubilee Government. On this side we could be whipped by the Majority Party to ensure that we are in the House to defend the Government position without even having read what was in those things. We were misled that it would be Kshs95 million annually. I fail to understand how it has varied from that Kshs95 million to where it is at Kshs200 million. The issue of leased equipment originated from cartels which are benefiting from that. I do not even have an idea of those companies which own this equipment. They are shadowy companies. This is simply a cash cow for the cartels. Therefore, let us allow the counties to have their money. These cartels who own this equipment should negotiate directly with these companies so that they can get value for money because there is that issue. We also have so many devolved functions which the national Government wants to usurp. One of them is housing where we are imposing the housing levy when it is a devolved function. Why is the national Government trying to grab that function and pretend that it is a key function? It is provided for in the Constitution as a county function. We are even allocating lots of money to it. We need to rethink all that. The issue of agriculture is devolved. We are funding the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries when we should re-channel all that money to the counties. Even universal health which should be the priority is not properly taken care of. We are only talking of The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposes only. Acertified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}