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{
    "id": 957069,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/957069/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 504,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. M. Kajwang'",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13162,
        "legal_name": "Moses Otieno Kajwang'",
        "slug": "moses-otieno-kajwang"
    },
    "content": "Secondly, there are certain counties that have lost. I would like the Senator for Mombasa County to take a deep interest in that Schedule on Equitable Share. Mombasa County has lost Kshs1 billion while Nakuru County has gained more than Kshs1 billion. Narok County has gained about Kshs1.3 billion. This is because of the fiscal responsibility measure that is based on own source revenue. It is a good thing that in considering the next revenue sharing formula, we said that fiscal responsibility shall go beyond own source revenue. The third one is on conditional allocations. It is unfortunate that the managed equipment scheme will get Kshs6.2 billion for the financial year. Even though I have listened to the Notice of Motion by the Senate Minority Leader, we will set up a select committee to look into this matter. Let us remember that the managed equipment scheme was a seven year programme. By the time we will be done with our enquiries and adopting reports, the seven years will be gone. Those shadowy people will already have been paid and we will be fishing for people to take action upon in a postmortem rather than proactive manner. The national Government has six grants while development partners have 13 grants and we have no framework for oversight of those grants. As the Chairperson of the County Public Accounts and Investments Committee (CPAIC), the Auditor-General will focus on equitable share and own source revenue. We have never seen an audit report on conditional grants and we need to come up with a framework for that. In the CARA, I believe we need to have a monitoring and evaluation framework for every conditional grant. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, allow me to talk about the issue of ceilings that has been introduced in the CARA. In the Public Finance Management (PFM) Act, county assemblies should get 7 per cent of sharable revenue or twice the emoluments. Looking at the percentages in the ceilings in this Act, for example, the ceiling for Homa Bay County Assembly is 12.6 per cent of the revenue from the national Government. It means that 12 per cent of the money from the national Government will go to the county assembly. How much will remain for development? If you look at Mombasa County, it is 9 per cent, 8.7 per cent for Nairobi City County, and 11.5 per cent of revenue for Kiambu County. We want to strengthen county assemblies, but we should not give them blank cheques. This is because from my experience in the CPAIC, we have seen a lot of rot coming from county assemblies that have surplus money. Just this morning in this Chamber with Members of the CPAIC, we established that they have taken trips to Singapore, Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and yet they have not considered and adopted reports for three financial years. We must look at the ceilings. If we depart from the 7 per cent that is in the PFM Act, let us adopt another percentage. It cannot be elastic because it brings a lot of mischief. The Road Maintenance Levy Fund (RMLF) is a conditional grant that goes to the counties. I urge the Committee on Roads and Transportation to conclude their consideration of the Roads Bill. The assumption of the national Government is that when they send Kshs8.9 billion to counties, then counties have enough money to do roads and infrastructure. That is far from the truth because we come from the counties. You will find that chief officers for public works and finance embezzle money because there are no mechanisms for oversight by county assemblies and at the national level."
}