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"id": 106646,
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Kiunjuri",
"speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister for Water and Irrigation",
"speaker": {
"id": 175,
"legal_name": "Festus Mwangi Kiunjuri",
"slug": "mwangi-kiunjuri"
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"content": ". The Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS) must satisfy the standards of the alcohol content. Let the people of Coast Province have their mnazi which is approved and accepted that it is a healthy alcoholic drink. We only have to limit the time. Alcohol has high content, but we have to limit the time it can be consumed which should be between 6.00 pm and 10.00 pm. By that time, a young man will have experienced a blackout, but will have no chance of waking up at 3.00 a.m. or 4.00 a.m. and continue drinking it. Secondly, people will argue that even if you do that, they will carry it home. We cannot limit consumption of beer completely. However, if you know the timing, that between this hour and that hour, you are not supposed to sell, the law will take its course. That way, we can reduce. When we talk about eradication of poverty in the country, we know for sure that we cannot completely eradicate poverty. However, we can go through processes of reduction. We must work in a way that we can reduce alcohol consumption in this country. We must come out with this law. I want to congratulate Mheshimiwa Mututho for having taken a bold step. We should not read mischief when we address this issue. It is a moral issue. We are interfering with creation. Even God himself never meant that creation does not continue by allowing our youth to be misused they way we are doing right now. We are already in contradiction of creation. We must allow a society that flourishes and is healthy. We cannot do so by allowing the youth to consume the illicit brew all the time. If you look at the genesis of all the problems we have today, they cannot be traced to more than 20 years ago. We used to have a controlled society. In the 70s, 80s and 90s, we could control the consumption of alcohol in this country. People had respect for the law. The chief and the assistant chiefs were respected. The village elders used to work. We could know the source of our problems. Today, the easiest thing to do is to control time for consumption of alcohol because the chief knows where the alcohol dens are. The villagers also know where those dens are. I thank the women of Kenya because they are very vigilant on this. They have even taken it upon themselves to destroy some of these beer dens. They make sure that those dens do not operate. What have we done? We have ignored them. What are our courts doing? We must make sure that 24 Wednesday, 7th April, 2010(A) as much as we pass this legislation, we must also go into other Acts of Parliament that will support this Act. Even if we came up with a Bill today that regulates these issues, by the end of the day, we will end up in courts. If we get to court, the penalty for somebody brewing illegal brew is only Kshs1, 000. If by brewing that illegal brew, he or she makes Kshs100, 000, then they are ready to pay 100 times. We must look at other legislations, so that we are assured of enough backing to implement what we will do in this House today. On the issue of morality, this is something we are discussing with regard to the draft Constitution. When we talk about abortion in the draft Constitution, the church is not comfortable with it. Why? This is because, at the end of the day, we are not able to control issues pertaining to morality. It is high time, as hon. Members, for the first time, that we started preaching what we believe in. We must tell Kenyans today that this is wrong even if I want to be elected the President or the Governor of this country. Tell them the truth and live with it. However, as long as we continue to make laws in this House that we do not respect, then we are not moving anywhere. For the first time, as we continue to make laws, we must agree from our local villages, how we can craft it. We must get hon. Members who are not shy of telling their people that they must stop taking alcohol. We must confront the youth and tell them what they are doing is not right. We must confront our district Commissioners and demand that they implement law. We must tell the chiefs to take their responsibilities. We must tell the village elders to refrain from taking bribes so as to save the society. Those of us who come from the Mt. Kenya region, we know that this is a real shame. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the other day, some young men were given a job to dig holes so that we could install electricity in the villages; one young man took the whole day to dig one hole, while another strong or energetic young man who had not consumed these brews dug ten holes in a day. He made Kshs2, 000 while the other one struggled from morning to evening, to just do a three-foot hole. That is how pathetic it is. The other day, I was transferring some aloe plants from Nairobi to Nanyuki and, I faced a similar problem, whereby two young men could not lift an 80 Kilogramme bag. Naturally, two of them could not lift the bag, when, personally, I can still lift one even at my age and carry it to the lorry. If you look at these young men, they are too heavy. They are big body wise but cannot lift that bag. I got so shocked. I went to the constituency once again and asked some of them to unload that truck; they could not. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, sir, today, some people joke around that when they get home, instead of sleeping in bed, they sleep under the bed. Is this the society that we are trying to create? These are the facts on the ground. How do you expect a young man, who does not know how he got to his home, and the following morning at 6 am, he is already very drunk, to ever know any other business in that house? This is a very serious issue. We must come up with stringent measures. We should look at it again but we must have moral ground to go and campaign for it. For the first time, we should say no to irresponsible drinking and we say yes to licensing of those brews that are favourable to our youth and which they can afford but at the same time control the way we consume alcohol. With those few remarks, I beg to support."
}