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{
"id": 1399561,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399561/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Wakili Sigei",
"speaker_title": "The Temporary Speaker",
"speaker": null,
"content": " Thank you, Sen. Maanzo. Sen. Thangwá, proceed."
},
{
"id": 1399562,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399562/?format=api",
"text_counter": 266,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
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"content": "Thank you very much, Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, for this opportunity to also weigh in on The Conflict of Interest Bill, 2023 (National Assembly Bills No.12 of 2023). As I do that, it is also good to say that in today's Order Paper, I see my Bill, the Public Holidays (Amendment) Bill, (Senate Bills No.31 of 2023), is scheduled to be debated. I take this opportunity to say that, maybe we can discuss it after the holidays because tomorrow is Good Friday. We have a Saturday and Sunday in between and again Monday is a holiday. I would want Kenyans to take these four holidays and see what they can do with it. Then, from there, we will get to know whether the Public Holidays (Amendment) Bill, (Senate Bills No.31 of 2023) is still viable. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, the issue of conflict of interest, as much as I would not want to say whether I am in support of this or not or probably bring amendments or not, in our culture, society and country, conflict of interest is immeasurable. We should have come up with a Bill that has indicators that will mention them by name and words. That, if you do this, you will have broken the law. If we leave it like that, just everybody needs to declare a conflict of interest on a certain matter, what will you call these examples that I want to give you? When we talk about bias in your work as a public officer, personal relationship, self-dealing, preferential treatment to somebody as a friend, that is conflict of interest. In this House, we have conducted a few impeachment hearings. I want to give you an example of the impeachment of the Governor of Meru County, whereby a deputy governor was a witness, and he wanted his governor to be impeached. Would you call that conflict of interest because he was the next beneficiary if that impeachment"
},
{
"id": 1399563,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399563/?format=api",
"text_counter": 267,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
},
{
"id": 1399564,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399564/?format=api",
"text_counter": 268,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "occurred? He is the person who could have gotten that seat. Does that mean that is conflict of interest or he was exercising his mandate to make sure that Meru County get rid of the governor as per the allegations that were there then? In the impeachment of the Deputy Governor of Kisii County that we just did the other day, we saw a father and a son giving their accusation and testimonies on the Floor of this House against one another. One was a friend of the Deputy Governor, and the other one was conned by the said person as per the allegations that were there. Would you say that is also conflict of interest? This Bill, as I said, should come out clearer. If you look at the definitions, what is a private interest? It says- “It means a personal benefit, privilege, exemption or advantage that a public officer or a person affiliated to a public officer may gain from the office that the public officer holds, and which may influence the judgment of a public officer in the exercise of the public duty but does not include interest in decision or a matter to that.” Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, I believe a deputy governor, who would benefit from such a seat when a governor is removed from office, from this definition, that will be conflict of interest. When you talk about conflict of interest, sometimes it is unrealistic if we do not give it proper indicators. The Members of Parliament from the National Assembly issue bursaries through the National Government Constituencies Development Fund (NG-CDF). They are the Members of Parliament and the ones who issue these bursaries, and they still benefit from that politically. Would you not call that conflict of interest? When it comes to an MP issuing bursaries to the people and he is only doing that within the period that he is an MP. That means somebody in that ward or that constituency who would want to vie for that seat, will be somehow disadvantaged in the future, because this MP is issuing bursaries yet you are not giving anything at that particular time. The Bill should be clearer. We shall be moving some amendment. If you look at Section 31A (1), if I could read- “This Section determines the responsible Commission for a public officer for the purposes of this Act. “ The Commission that will be mandated to oversight certain entities, agents and other Government officers and officials. It goes ahead, in Section 31A (2) to say- “The Committee of the National Assembly responsible for the ethics of members is the responsible commission for– (a) The Cabinet. (b) Members of the National Assembly. (c) The Director of Public Prosecution. (d) The Secretary to the Cabinet. (e) Members of the Judicial Service Commission. (f) Members of Commissions and independent offices specified under Chapter 15 of the Constitution; and"
},
{
"id": 1399565,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399565/?format=api",
"text_counter": 269,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
},
{
"id": 1399566,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399566/?format=api",
"text_counter": 270,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
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"speaker": null,
"content": "(g) members of the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission and staff of the Commission holding the rank of deputy director and above.” I have no problem with that. However, if you read Section 31A (3), it says- “The committee of the Senate responsible for the ethics of Members is the responsible Commission for Senators.” If you read that, a whole Senate that is mandated to oversight Cabinet Secretaries has only been reduced to oversight themselves. That is why they appear before the committees of the House. We cannot ask them when it comes to matters of conflict of interest. That is where everything begins. I will bring in an amendment. Instead of saying; the “Committee of the National Assembly”, we will be saying, the “Committee of Parliament”. This is so that either House, that is the National Assembly and the Senate can check on matters conflict of interest to the Cabinet, Members of Parliament (MPs), each House will take care of their Members, the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP), Secretary to the Cabinet, the members of Judicial Service Commission (JSC), members of the commission in the independent offices and members of Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC). Can you imagine that this House was only mandated to check themselves? This clause will call this whole Senate to first of all, pause everything that we are doing and discuss this issue. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, the other day the EACC gave a report. The report was on the bribery index. They mentioned some of the counties that bribe as much money. They talked about Nyamira County which on average, somebody is bribing Kshs163,000 to get employment. Yet you see, on the Floor of this House, somebody said that they gave Kshs800,000 to get an opportunity to work for the County of Kisii and that person was also from Nyamira. What I am trying to say is that these bodies that we are giving this mandate can give us statistics and tell us people are bribing in this county and yet, they are not doing anything. They are just acting - I am talking about EACC - as just an opinion poll kind of commission. A commission that will just come and tell us; the people of this county are known to be bribing and yet, they have not arrested or taken anybody to court or even issued warnings, if the law permits that. Yet, as a Senate, we are told that we should not call them and ask them questions. The National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) was among the Government bodies that are accepting huge amounts of bribes. They were number one followed by the Judiciary and county governments in that order. County governments are not in Section 31(a)(3). As the Senate, we are taking away our mandate to check the county governments when it comes to conflict of interest. Who are they giving this mandate? The committee of the county assembly responsible for the ethics of members is a responsible commission for County Executive Committees Members (CECM), MCAs and the members of the secretary of respective county public service board. No one has been given an opportunity to oversight governors. Governors are free to do whatever they want to if this Bill was to pass the way it is. They have not been mentioned anywhere, even when it comes to the MCAs. Once we get to the Third"
},
{
"id": 1399567,
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"text_counter": 271,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
},
{
"id": 1399568,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399568/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
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"speaker": null,
"content": "Reading, we will be bringing such amendments. This is because governors are the ones who are exercising conflict of interest more that anybody. If you read the law in this country, no one is a CEO of a certain government other than governors. The President is not even a CEO of the country but the governors are. They are the ones who through their CECMs executive mandates and implement budgetary allocations. The issue of governors should be here as a section by itself. Governors are the ones who are not paying pending bills, they are the ones who are convincing MCAs to pass budgets that are unrealistic, so that they can commit county monies even without having it. I am happy that the other day, the President of this Republic, President William Ruto, convened a sitting with all heads and CEOs of parastatals. He told them not to execute or commit a budget of monies that they do not have. If you do not have that amount, do not commit it. That is the way to go to fight pending bills. This is what we need to do to the Governors also because they are committing money. In the case of Kiambu County, we have had four Governors. When somebody realises that they cannot be re-elected, they commit monies to entities in the name of collecting bribes from contractors. The moment they commit money, they issue contracts and they get their bribes. Then, they are not voted for and they go home leaving the contractor asking for the next Governor to pay their pending bills. The next governor will never pay because one; you did not have proper papers, probably you did not execute or support that governor. This issue of pending bills will only end once we stop the governors from over projecting a certain percentage of their own-source revenues. That is to say I have an amendment to the Public Finance Management (PFM) Act that will be coming to this House. I am requesting Members of the Senate to support it when it comes before the counties pass their budgets. That, you cannot over project your own-source revenue for the next financial year more than 20 per cent of what you collected in the previous audited year. This is because, if you do that, you will also spend what you do not have and if you spend what you do not have, you will never ever cure the issue of pending bills. As I conclude, for you to get clarity on what I meant by this, Kiambu County has projected to collect Kshs8 billion because it is Kshs7.9 billion. So far, they have only collected Kshs1.6 billion. Half within the financial year so that means, within the next half of the financial year, they are going to collect another Kshs1.6 billion. That will be Kshs3.2 billion. If you minus Kshs3.2 billion from Kshs8 billion, that is a county that has gone short of almost Kshs5 billion yet, they have committed that amount and given contractors work worth Kshs5 billion. They have pending bills of Kshs5.7 billion so by the end of this year, I am telling you, the County Government of Kiambu will have pending bills of Kshs10 billion. For us to cure this, we have to support such kind of laws and come up with such amendments. As I support this Conflict of Interest Bill, allow me to bring some amendment when we get there. Thank you very much."
},
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"id": 1399569,
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"text_counter": 273,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Thang’wa",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
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{
"id": 1399570,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399570/?format=api",
"text_counter": 274,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Wakili Sigei",
"speaker_title": "The Temporary Speaker",
"speaker": null,
"content": " Sen. Crystal Asige, you may have the Floor."
}
]
}