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{
    "id": 911033,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/911033/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 654,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Kibiru",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13196,
        "legal_name": "Charles Reubenson Kibiru",
        "slug": "charles-reubenson-kibiru"
    },
    "content": "NOW THEREFORE, the Senate recommends that the National Treasury in partnership with the Controller of Budget, Commission on Revenue Allocation, the Council of Governors and the County Assemblies Forum to- 1. Ensure that all the County Integrated Development Plans (CIDP’s) and Annual Development Plans (ADP’s) are aligned to Vision 2030 with an implementation, monitoring, and evaluation framework in place; 2. Address Pending Bills by prioritizing their payment, creating clear timeframes for payment and publishing a schedule of payment of the same; and 3. Prioritize the completion of stalled development projects prior to undertaking or funding new projects. Thank you, Madam Temporary Speaker, for giving me this opportunity. This Motion is critical. We all know that Kshs366 billion is not a small amount of money. We have many stalled projects in Kirinyaga that go up to the tune of Kshs200 million. In the last financial year, Kirinyaga County got about Kshs4 billion. The percentage of money that has been put into those projects is enormous. The Kshs200 million can help us improve healthcare in our county. The stalled projects include health centres, water projects, roads and bridges. In line with the SDGs, we need to tell our governors, especially those who are serving their first term, that they need to take care of our pending bills, because the time value of money is important. In project management, it is irrational to start a new project when the old project has not been completed. We should criminalise people who start new projects when there are stalled projects. Most of the governors do not continue with the stalled projects, because they either do not like the area or they feel that the area did not vote for them. They also start new projects for political expedience or for individual benefit. We have stalled projects in all the counties and the Senators who are here will bear me witness to that. Most of the stalled projects were either started by the previous governors or the previous Members of Parliament (MPs), who were using the National Government Constituency Development Fund (NG-CDF) to construct them. As a country, we need to ask ourselves if that is corruption, and my answer to that will be yes. How can we allow ourselves to have Kshs366 billion of stalled projects, yet we are borrowing money to start new projects? We need to think of how we are operating in this country. Madam Temporary Speaker, we know that this country has borrowed a lot of money to do development. Even in the national Government, leave alone the county governments, we have very many stalled projects. As a result, we are now talking about Kshs180 billion of pending bills. I keep asking how we got ourselves into this mess where we are now talking about a figure of Kshs180 billion in pending bills. According to the Public Finance Management (PFM) Act, we are not supposed procure services or projects if we do not have the finances. One wonders the point in time when the rain started beating us to the extent that pending bills are increasing. 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."
}