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{
    "id": 908704,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/908704/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 198,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Matungulu, WDM-K",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Stephen Mule",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2321,
        "legal_name": "Stephen Mutinda Mule",
        "slug": "stephen-mutinda-mule"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, for giving me this opportunity to debate and look at the Budget Report. We have a clear responsibility as Parliament to make sure that we do our duties and make sure that the Government and the people of Kenya have a well-balanced Budget. I want to put it very clearly to the Budget and Appropriations Committee that we have looked at the issue of health in the Budget. Look at the Budget Policy recommendation which has been done by the Budget and Appropriations Committee. We in the Departmental Committee on Health have interacted with the Ministry of Health for the last one year. We interacted with them during the BPS process and we came and looked at the Budget and realised that there are serious gaps which need to be relooked at. I want to pick policy number one on the health sector that the Budget and Appropriations Committee has made. It is about Kshs4.6 billion which is supposed to be used in the rollout of universal healthcare. This is a mockery to this House for the simple reason that the pilot counties for UHC in the last Parliament were allocated Kshs5.2 billion for only four counties. This year, we are allocating Kshs4.6 billion for 43 counties. What we did as the Departmental Committee on Health is that we looked at this figure and it is a meagre figure to rollout the UHC. First and foremost, we need to have the report of the four pilot counties. As a Committee, we agreed to reallocate this figure to various sectors especially the referral hospitals to make sure that we strengthen the UHC. Once the ministry gives us the report on the pilot counties, we will come back to this House and do a supplementary budget to allocate enough money. My surprise is the Budget and Appropriations Committee, after agreeing with our Chair on this, has not effected it. The second issue on the health sector is that of the money to Level 5 hospitals. This is the money which is distributed to only 11 hospitals in the country leaving out the others. The amount is about Kshs4.3 billion. To the surprise of our Committee, neither the National Treasury nor the ministry has given back an accountability report for the last four years on how this money has been allocated to Level 5 hospitals. There is no indication whether the money has reached the hospitals or whether there is any report given back to this House for evaluation to ensure there is value for that money. As a Committee, we decided to pend this issue and the Budget and Appropriations Committee agreed with us that there should be a framework. We need to do a framework to make sure that, that money goes straight to those institutions. The Budget and Appropriations Committee, after agreeing with us, is keeping this money pending somewhere when Kenyans are dying at Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH). I urge the Budget and Appropriations Committee – as the Departmental Committee on Health, we have forwarded our amendments to them. I want them to look at the amendments not from the individual’s point of view or from the Committee’s point of view, but from the point of view of the health of Kenyans. This is because if we reallocate that Kshs4.3 billion to the KNH and Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital (MTRH), they will deal with the menace of cancer in this country. The Budget and Appropriations Committee, after getting all these recommendations from the Departmental Committee on Health, has kept quiet. It is high time we called a spade a spade. 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."
}