Entry Instance

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

{
    "id": 93284,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/93284/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 185,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. ole Metito",
    "speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister for Regional Development Authorities",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 199,
        "legal_name": "Judah Katoo Ole-Metito",
        "slug": "judah-ole-metito"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. I also want to give my strong support to this Vote 20 - Ministry of Water and Irrigation. It is a service Ministry and I really want to echo its achievements during the able leadership of the Minister and her able teams. They are focusing on reforms. I want to start from where my party leader has stopped; the issue of tariffs, especially on two issues; one, the National Water Conservation and Pipeline Corporation which is in my area where we have the Nol-Turesh Water Company. The tariffs are very high and they were raised without any consultations with the stakeholders and they are not uniform. It is time the Ministry reviewed these tariffs. Currently, you find one water user being charged Kshs2,000 per month, another user who is just a kilometer away being charged Kshs5,000 per month while another is charged Kshs3,000 per month. So it is good to review these tariffs because they are high and the stakeholders should be consulted when deciding those water tariffs. Still again on that, along the Nol-Turesh Water Company, it is good that the Ministry opens several free water points for the community because they suffered during the construction of that pipeline. It was actually agreed previously that after every five kilometers, there should be a communal free water point but that is not happening. I kindly ask the Ministry to check on that. Again on the water tariffs, the Water Resource Management Authority (WARMA), as hon. Ms. Karua has put it, is charging the community too high because of using water for irrigation. The amount varies from Kshs500,000 to Kshs1 million per irrigation scheme. That also ought to be streamlined. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I want to bring to the attention of the Minister that there are many water offices both at the constituency level and the district level. They include irrigation office, the pipeline office, the WARMA and the Ministry offices. These too many reforms have really brought confusion because nobody is taking full responsibility at the Ministry level. They all say they head district departments. The Ministry should try to streamline and harmonize those offices that are offering services to wananchi so that there is at least a central point for co-ordination. I think this is what the Minister meant when she said that they want to revisit the Water Act 2002, because it is that Act that created all these offices. I think there was an oversight, we forgot to create the central point for co-ordination purposes. Finally, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, a lot of money for services at the constituency level is going through the water service boards. The country has a number of water service boards which have drilled boreholes and dug dams which need to be desilted once in a while. However, I have a concern with the Athi Water Service Board which serves my area. I have always been saying on the Floor of this House that the headquarters for the Athi Water Service Board is not in a central point. It is situated in Kitui and we always feel that some of us are disadvantaged. It is not a simple thing going all the way from Taveta to Kitui to seek services. We have always asked the Ministry to relocate the headquarters to Machakos Town so that the water service board can serve everybody equitably. Machakos is the central point for the Athi Water Service Board. At that point, it can serve all the way from Namanga, Kitui to where we border Taveta Constituency. I am sure it will do more good to the people in those regions. I hope this time it is even going to be streamlined in line with the new Constitution whereby we will be focusing on the counties as the central point for development. With those few remarks, I beg to support."
}