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{
    "id": 1133984,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1133984/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 219,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Nambale, ANC",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Sakwa Bunyasi",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2511,
        "legal_name": "John Sakwa Bunyasi",
        "slug": "john-sakwa-bunyasi"
    },
    "content": " I have no difficulty with that at all. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, I listened intently as the President delivered his Speech to this House yesterday. Let me start with the positive side. He was eloquent. On the eloquence scale, he gets an A or an A+. The credit goes to his very good speechwriters and spin-doctors. The presentation was eloquent, but with tremendous amount of spinning, which is not unusual for a political statement of that kind. It was after all a marketing statement. He is completely within his rights to say exactly how he graded himself. I had some concerns on the things that were not sufficiently brought out or not brought out at all. Let me start with the challenge we currently have in the education sector. We have a major crisis in education. The Teachers Service Commission (TSC), which is the employer of teachers, is acting like the 19th Century industrial revolution era England and suppressing the trade union movement of teachers. That is not a good thing. It does not augur well for us. More importantly, there is a crisis in tertiary education, particularly university education. University education is in a big crisis. Many universities are highly destabilised. Moi University, Egerton University and others are grumbling. Something needs to be done. Under his watch, he should ensure that the leadership in education stabilises that particular factor. It is a major concern. The second major area that he did not even touch is our economy, which is in a crisis. He did not mention it. He mentioned a number of good things that have happened, including the growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which included rebasing. Rebasing is simply when you adjust the base year and, therefore, get a slightly better series than you had before. In this case, the effect of rebasing was at least a 30 per cent growth in our economy since 2014. That did not come out. It only came out as if it was a policy-driven growth rate that changed the economy. I call that bit the “spinning effect.” Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, more importantly is the issue of the public debt that is glaring before us. Public debt is important not just as a macroeconomic matter. You can even ignore that aspect. Currently, nearly 75 per cent of the revenue collected goes towards debt repayment. Look at it from a budget perspective. When we say in relation to exports and so on, people do not know the export figures and it does not even seem to touch them. However, the commitment on the money that we collect is heavy. Therefore, the capacity of the economy to do other essential things will be lacking. That is a matter that needs to be addressed. 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."
}