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{
    "id": 1106004,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1106004/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 248,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Sakaja",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13131,
        "legal_name": "Johnson Arthur Sakaja",
        "slug": "johnson-arthur-sakaja"
    },
    "content": "This discussion is coming at a time when we are also discussing the labour migration policy. As I speak, our country does not have labour migration laws. That is why we have Kenyans undergoing a lot of troubles and experiencing hard times especially in the Middle East. We did a tour. The Committee on Labour and Social Welfare will bring a report to the Senate on our inquiry in the next few days. In our inquiry, we realised that, for instance, in Saudi Arabia, there are more than 88,700 Kenyans working there. That is a major importer of labour. There are 14 million non-Saudis working in the country. There are some jobs the Saudis would rather not do because of wealth. Out of the 88,700, a good number of Kenyans have had challenges. I do not know if it is a coincidence. If you look at my timeline on Twitter, there is a gentleman called Obedo Brown who has just twitted asking me to assist them locate and repatriate back to Kenya the body of their brother Hudson Obedo who is said to have died on 16th while in detention in Saudi Arabia. The body is at Shamesi Hospital. There are so many cases like this. Every time a case arises, it has to take the intervention of elected leaders to connect them with the missions abroad. That should not be the case. I am glad that the Principal Secretary (PS) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said emphatically that until we are able to guarantee the safety and wellbeing of Kenyans working in those countries, we must stop for a period of time the export of labour. We have many agents who do not tell people the expectations. Since there is hunger for jobs, many of our girls are going without knowing what they are taking themselves to. They are also not trained properly for the jobs they are going for. They are being harassed because of that. There is a reason we have that and I will give an example. The Philippines has the highest number of immigrant workers in countries of the Middle East. However, their workers are treated better because there is a diaspora office which does country to country negotiations. You will be shocked that the cost of sending money from Saudi Arabia or Qatar to the Philippines is much less because they have negotiated. They have even negotiated the cost of making phone calls by their workers. They have a lower rate of making phones calls to their families. The government knows where each and every person from the country works. There is a system which we looked at. I had a meeting with Ministry of Labour and Social Protection as well as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. For instance, we should know where Grace Akinyi who left Kenya is, the family they are working for, their pay and the phone number we can contact her on. We need to know where every Kenyan working outside is. I am glad that there is reference to that in this Bill. With respect to a database, I would propose a raft of amendments that will have a lot of borrowing from the labour migration policy to make sure that we secure this. If you look at our Constitution, a Kenyan is a Kenyan no matter where they reside. A Kenyan should have access to the rights that Kenyans in Kenya enjoy, whether they are in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Brazil, India or USA. Madam Temporary Speaker, I have said repeatedly that a first class country cannot have a second class citizen. We must not accept any of our citizens to be treated as"
}