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{
    "id": 1183492,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1183492/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 154,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Emurua Dikirr, UDA",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Johana Kipyegon",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "The other purpose of land is speculation. The immediate Member who was debating on this matter claimed that our land has been used for speculation wrongly. It is part of business. Land is also used as an economic value. People use it for speculation. If they want to make money, it is part of investment. The fact that speculations or the cost of land is rising is not a bad thing. It is one way of an economic value to the land. Land is also used for investment. There are so many people who would not know where to put their money or the money they have, other than to buy or save that money in land. Obviously, land appreciates. It does not depreciate like machines. People normally put their money on land. Especially inheritance for their children because 20 years after you have bought maybe one acre of land, it will cost more than three or four times during the time your children maybe inheriting it. It is not for a bad reason. The most important thing that needs to be discussed in this particular proposal is that if truly we want to make our country and land productive, we need to find a way that we allow the tracts of land which are meant for farming to remain so. This one can happen through rural to urban migration. The introduction of affordable housing in this country will go a long way in helping actually those people who are living in villages to live in towns and allow the farms in the villages to be used now for the purpose that they were intended for. If our land is arable, why would we build houses in those lands? Why would we make each and every part of your family live in every corner? If the land is arable allow that land to be farmed and be used productively. If people want to live or want to have houses, allow people to just build a house in a place where we cannot farm so that we allow the arable part of their farms to be used for farming. The intention of this particular Article is not to destroy any ownership of land; it is intended to allow the parts that arable in this country to be very productive so that we shall not be crying each and every year for lack of maize, rice or foodstuffs. The country is very productive. It is only that we are so lazy that we do not want to use the productive part of land to ensure that the country is food sufficient. The intention of this particular proposal is good. It is only that we need to have a proper public participation or sensitisation amongst ourselves so that we can understand the main intention. Another issue which is very contentious is the imagination that the land that is idle is going to be taken away by the Government. The Constitution is clear on the ownership of land regardless of whichever method you got that parcel of land. As long as you are properly registered, it is your land. If the Government wants to acquire it or have it for any use, it cannot be by force. You just buy or compensate the owner of the land. The notion where people are claiming that most of the tracts of land will be taken away by the Government is not true. There is a lot of idle land and there is what we call absentee landlords. This one must be addressed properly because right now there are many people who are landless and have nowhere to farm. There are many areas where the Government needs to farm. We just saw in the previous Government where it leased land, Galana Kulalu and put out billions of monies for irrigation but never made that profit that was meant to be and did provide food for the country. Instead, the Government should look into those idle lands, negotiate with the owners, farm there, irrigate that land, and produce food for this particular country. Hon. Temporary Speaker, there is nowhere in this country where any idle land shall be taken away from anybody because I do not think there is such land in this country. All land in The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for informationpurposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}