Johnson Arthur Sakaja

All parliamentary appearances

Entries 4471 to 4480 of 5036.

• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: and Asset Disposal Bill. This is a Bill with more than 185 clauses. It took us quite a lot of time as the Departmental Committee on Finance, Planning and Trade to go through. So, I congratulate them, one, for having expedited this Bill and, two, for having made sure that the gains that the National Assembly had put in for women, youth and people with disability to access 30 per cent procurement opportunities have been locked in. view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: If you look at the amendments, and they have only done five key amendments, none of them is out of the blues. I would like to speak particularly on Clause 33. It is important that the county governments actually implement the reservations and preferences to make sure that 20 per cent of the procurement goes to the locals. This is indeed a very welcome move because devolution was supposed to enhance the economic well-being of Kenyans in all parts of the country. As we do this, and I am glad that in Article 158 the National Assembly introduced a secretariat ... view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: We have been going round the country with the Joint Committee on National Cohesion and Equal Opportunity and we noted that the cohesion levels within our counties are very low because the dominant communities in each county have been getting undue advantage over the communities that are not necessarily dominant, but are equal stakeholders and players within those counties. Devolution was not created for us to have ethnic balkanisation in our country. It will be important to see how we define residence of a county. Everybody within a county needs to have an opportunity if they call that county their ... view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: Secondly, I will speak on Clause 124 which raised quite some heat within the Committee. It talks about evaluation of tenders by public entities and that the financial and technical capability of tenderers shall be given equal weight. There are two schools of thought. One is that some felt that this was an absolute statement that refers to all categories of tendering despite the fact that it is in Part X which talks about consultancy services and requests for proposals. In this Senate amendment, probably, the wording did not fully match the spirit of that amendment because it is in ... view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: Hon. Deputy Speaker, I am grateful that all in all the Committee agreed finally to support these amendments by the Senate. Usually when these Bills go to the other House, we find certain amendments that we are not comfortable with. However, we are very comfortable with the amendments that have come from the Senate. We support and pray that the President shall assent to it expeditiously so that our young people, women, people with disabilities and even the residents and locals in counties start taking advantage of the provisions and gains that have been made in this landmark legislation. With ... view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: Thank you very much for this opportunity, hon. Deputy Speaker. I would like to concur with the hon. Chairman of the Committee. Indeed, the office of the AG is very important in this country and has been provided for within our Constitution. It is important that we have a strong and independent office of the AG. However, there must be a very clear legal framework that provides for how the Office of the AG will accomplish that. We have considered this extensively within the Departmental Committee on Finance, Planning and Trade and, unfortunately and contrary to the earlier Bill which ... view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: I will just go quickly because the hon. Chairman has expounded on most of these reservations. The first one is on the qualification of the AG. We are not sure if this is a provision which is meant to lock out even the current AG or certain people who are likely to ascend to that position by asking for postgraduate qualification. We feel that it is too restrictive and it also locks out many of the young people who have excelled in audit. If you look at the Constitution, it is clear in Article 229(2). It says:- The electronic version ... view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: “To be qualified to be the Auditor-General, a person shall have extensive knowledge of public finance or at least ten years experience in auditing or public finance management.” We felt that, that is sufficient. view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: Secondly, on Clause 11, it creates a selection panel which has a certain representation, I think six of them are from the Government. It has certain Cabinet Secretaries (CSs) and representatives from the Association of the Private Sector and the Law Society of Kenya (LSK). Again, if you look at the Constitution, it is very simple and clear in Article 229(1) that:- view
• 26 May 2015 in National Assembly: “There shall be an Auditor-General who shall be nominated by the President and, with the approval of the National Assembly, appointed by the President.” view