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{
    "id": 1048517,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1048517/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 173,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. (Dr.) Musuruve",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13188,
        "legal_name": "Getrude Musuruve Inimah",
        "slug": "getrude-musuruve-inimah"
    },
    "content": "Madam Temporary Speaker, we must make its right in early childhood, so that we endow children with the right language, cognitive and physical development. Therefore, we cannot afford to waste our children at an early age. Madam Temporary Speaker, it is important that we develop children intellectually. This has a cost and the Government must be ready to bear it. Kenya is among the counties that ratified the United Nations (UN) Convention on children globally. In 1990, Kenya signed and ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of Child (UNCRC). Every child has a right to education. We cannot put the interests of children first when they are in class four or five. It has to start their early years. Therefore, this foundation has to be grounded. If you are putting up a house and your foundation is not right, you do not expect it will be firm when you reach lintels or first floor. It has to start from the foundation. The foundation of children begins at ECDE. We cannot afford to play around with the future of our children. As Sen. (Dr.) Milgo says clearly, there is need to allocate money to ensure that we have it right in ECDE. In the Committee on Education, we met 47 counties concerning ECDE. However, there are some counties with no programmes for PwDs. They had not allocated monies to cater for PwDs. They are still grappling on how to deal with those issues. We cannot be a nation that is advocating for 100 per cent transition from primary school to secondary if we are not doing it for our children with disabilities. Madam Temporary Speaker, we had an opportunity to go to Kitui during the Senate Mashinani . Sen. (Dr.) Zani is not here. She would have said what we saw. Sen. (Prof.) Ongeri is here. We visited some classrooms that were pathetic. There were children with disabilities that had no learning materials. In many counties, ECDE has not been given priority. I went to a school in my county and found that children with disabilities were learning from a store; there was no classroom. In some schools, there are no abolition blocks or provision of water. There are no tanks and strategies of harvesting water put in place. Madam Temporary Speaker, we cannot afford to ignore ECDE. We must look for ways in which counties can commit themselves and ensure that they are doing something about it. There is need for them to allocate 10 per cent of their budget for the purpose of ECDE. That is Sen. (Dr.) Milgo’s prayer. We should not ignore her prayer. We must make county visits to ensure that something is happening with regard to ECDE. Some counties appeared before the Committee on Education and we asked them about the school feeding programmes in their respective counties. A school brings equalization among children. There are children who do not even take a cup of tea at home because their parents cannot afford. In school, there is equal opportunity. Children wear uniform to show they are equal. There is need for the feeding programme to be in place, so that children are given porridge in the morning and food, which should be across the board. This is so that we help children from disadvantaged families to afford a meal and, at the same time, access education. There is need to ensure that counties are keen about assessment centres. Every county needs to have an assessment centre. This is something I raised in the Committee. These centres will ensure that children are assessed at an early age. If a child has any disability, then it is detected at an early age and be placed in the right centre. When the The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}