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{
    "id": 1055729,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1055729/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 287,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Ndaragwa, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Jeremiah Kioni",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 49,
        "legal_name": "Jeremiah Ngayu Kioni",
        "slug": "jeremiah-kioni"
    },
    "content": "interventions that need to be made. It is also important to note that when the new Companies Act was enacted and the old one repealed, the guiding principle was to make Kenya one of the countries where you can start and do business easily, and where you have little registration that hinders one’s ability to carry out business. I believe the Member paid attention to that goal when he crafted this Bill, so that we do not end up with legislation that will take us back to where we were. If we make it difficult for Kenyans and foreigners to carry out business in our country, it will have a direct effect on our employment and job creation which is in need in this country. It is also important to take note of what happened in the USA in their last general elections. The big tech giants had a say in those elections because they had the monopoly of their telecommunication industry. They switched off the former President when they thought they should. Without doubt in my mind, that influenced the outcome of the elections in one way or the other. The reason is that USA has allowed the private sector to completely take over telecommunication and that is the price you pay when such useful sectors are not under any form of control by the public. It is a something that we should learn from as a country. We have our telecommunications journalists. Certainly, they are the ones controlling the space and everything that goes with it and we need to be careful as a country, because I believe it is also a security issue. If the Fuliz a vending end of this bargain is not under any form of control, like it is alleged in this Bill, then without a doubt, we have been asleep. The amount of money the Government can make in terms of revenue collection is huge. Also, without the Government having an eye on this product, the kind of exploitation that can be meted on Kenyans is unbelievable. I want to commend Hon. Elisha Odhiambo for having picked up this issue. It is upon those who think that this issue is covered to show us how it has been covered for us to defeat this Bill. The other thing is dropping of calls, something that is very common in Ndaragwa. We have people who are in very serious businesses, but somewhere in the middle of a conversation you lose connectivity. Since we have left the industry to the private sector, I believe they need to run it well. It is important that the operators suffer some penalty for not being diligent. The Communications Authority also has a role to play. It seems to have left everything to the private sector and it is happy when work it should be doing is being done by others. We must commend the private entities; they have filled a gap and they have helped this country to grow in a big way. Now that we are talking about telecommunication, just like my colleague has talked about bloggers, the Chairman of the Committee needs to own up and say that they abandoned the Kenya Broadcasting Corporation (KBC). The national broadcaster has been left to rot, perhaps to be sold to the lowest bidder at one point in the life of our country. There is little that we are doing. Young Kenyans employed in that company are not being paid. Their five-month salaries are in arrears. We instead rely on the private sector to carry Government directives. The point at which the private sector will find it uneconomical to carry a Government announcement is the time we will realise how important it is to have a public-controlled-and-funded entity like KBC, because it will always carry the message the way the Government wants. Kenyans can do what they want with the message, but the Government should get out the message the way it wants, at the time it wants and to the extent it wants. The private sector will carry those messages only to the extent that they make money out of it, and you cannot blame them for that. We have to be very careful with the monopoly that we are seeing. We saw what happened with Twitter and Facebook. It is a global challenge. One young man moves around and decides who should be where and who should access what at what time. It is good innovation, but also very dangerous in terms of security of this country and other parts of the world. I thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker. The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}