Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 1173489,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1173489/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 234,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Dagoretti South, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. John Kiarie",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13322,
        "legal_name": "John Kiarie Waweru",
        "slug": "john-kiarie-waweru"
    },
    "content": "that country, and that is where we are headed because we were borrowing prudently in the Kibaki Government. We had a semblance of sensible borrowing in the first term of the Jubilee Government. But by the time we were getting into the second term of the Jubilee Government, our borrowing had actually gone haywire. That money that we are borrowing in such a manner is actually a debt that we are putting on the future of this country. Economic cycles have proved that any economic boom driven by debt is normally followed by a very major slump and the slump here is going to be informed by many issues, some of which are beyond this country’s ability. We have an economic downturn globally. We have the effects of COVID. Now if this slump finds us in a big debt problem, actually we will end up shutting down this country and, in fact mortgaging, it to our lenders who will now be demanding for money that we do not have because our budget cannot even finance the repayments of the loans that we have borrowed so far. So, if our budget cannot finance what we have borrowed, we are now borrowing to pay the people who we had borrowed from earlier. We are borrowing from Peter to pay Paul; which now ends up giving us a problem even when we come to our development budget. That is because if we are repaying debts to the tune of over Kshs1 trillion, then where do we find money to go into development? Finally, I would like to say that when we were talking about the Medium Term Debt Strategy, this issue came up. Today, we cannot afford to push the cart further down the road. Let us say no to the increase of the debt ceiling. Let us stop digging the hole. Let us start climbing up from the hole that we have so that we can only consume that which we have in terms of our resources and we stop consuming that which we have not made, thinking that it is free money being given to us while we know it is not a grant. It is actually a loan that we have to pay. If Kenya did not borrow even an extra shilling today, we would pay the debts we have up to the year 2099 meaning that generations after us will have to pay dearly for the mistakes that we might end up making today. I oppose vehemently to the rising of the debt ceiling in this country."
}