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{
    "id": 964878,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/964878/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 214,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Westlands, ODM",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Tim Wanyonyi",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 3036,
        "legal_name": "Timothy Wanyonyi Wetangula",
        "slug": "timothy-wanyonyi-wetangula"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker. I also want to support the Report. It is very disturbing that an office as serious as the Office of the Auditor-General could remain vacant. It speaks volumes about the managers of this country. I remember we do not even have a substantive Cabinet Secretary for the National Treasury. We have an acting one. At one point in time, we did not have a substantive Cabinet Secretary for Interior and Coordination of National Government. We had an acting one. That was after Hon. Nkaisserry passed on. There are too many acting chief executive officers of government agencies. This is a practice that should end. We need to fill these vacancies. We have Kenyans who are qualified. We also need transition. When somebody is exiting from office, the next office holder should be appointed even when the other one is still in office, so that there is some kind of continuity to ensure a smooth transition. When we leave offices vacant like this, we create a vacuum. We create a situation that people may exploit to do funny things. You can imagine what could be going on because there is a lot of standstill in Government offices. They cannot be audited, some reports are being delayed or some action is being delayed because of these vacancies. Somebody must have slept on the job. They should wake up and do their work. The Committee should take this matter very seriously and conclude it urgently, so that we do not go on recess before we resolve the issue. We should make sure the offices do not remain vacant. Hon. Members will remember the circus we have in the Judiciary as a result of the President declining to appoint judges. That has also brought a lot of issues on the independence of the Judiciary. These are constitutional bodies. The Judiciary is the third arm of the Government, and it must be taken seriously. We would like to urge the Government and the agencies and offices involved, like the Public Service Commission, to take up this matter as quickly as possible. The Office of the Auditor-General has remained vacant for the last four months. It may even go for six months. We do not know. This means even the fight against corruption will be compromised. If the Auditor-General is not exposing some of the issues going on in the Government, then we will not have information to deal with matters of corruption. The past holder of the Office of the Auditor-General, Mr. Edward Ouko, did an exemplary work. He was very passionate about audit issues, and he was very sensitive when dealing with issues. Even areas of the Government that had never been audited were audited. Some of the scandals that we have seen were exposed through his work. So, we would like to urge that this matter be taken very seriously. 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."
}