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{
    "id": 1200701,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1200701/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 104,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Konoin, UDA",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Brighton Yegon",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "In my constituency, we also have multinational companies that are covering almost one-third of the constituency – that is the Unilever, James Finlay, and Williamson tea farming companies. In the spirit of employment that is born through agricultural production, these multinationals have exhibited some misbehaviour and bad manners. They have actually sent home more than 15,000 employees through forced early retirement, redundancy and disciplinary dismissal. This has actually rendered very many of my constituents jobless due to introduction of tea picking machines. This has done more harm than good. We need to call upon these multinational companies to exercise restraint and balance between mechanisation to optimize profits and employment. As much as we appreciate mechanisation, the multinational companies must also appreciate that the only benefit we get from them is employment. When they are no longer employing our people, they will have outlived their usefulness. I am calling upon these multinational companies to think about balancing between mechanisation to optimize profits and employment, so that we can have as many people as possible employed. The President emphasised on the hustler’s fund. This is actually to support Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) through affordable credit that will allow them to expand businesses for mama mboga, kinyozi and the boda boda industry for them to thrive and expand in line with the bottom-up economic model. The President also talked about matters of water. He talked about raising the target of access to water from the current 60 per cent to 80 per cent. In my constituency, there was a project called Bosto Water Project. The water project was supposed to serve five constituencies – four constituencies in Bomet and one constituency in Kericho County. The project was to be financed by the Chinese Exim Bank but the previous regime sabotaged it for political reasons. In the spirit of raising the target of water coverage from 60 to 80 per cent, we hope, pray and beseech this Government to jumpstart the project because the money is still lying at the National Treasury. So, the project can start as soon as possible and we can access clean tap water. There is the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF), which the President spoke about. The NHIF should be restructured to enable it become fit as a social insurance scheme that caters for all, including those with chronic illnesses. It should cater for terminal diseases like cancer, as the disease has drained many families’ resources. Many families have sold their land and property to pay for hospital bills. Since the Kenya Kwanza Government has promised to restructure NHIF, we appreciate it. That is a plausible initiative. The President talked about the NG-CDF. He said it should be aligned to the Constitution because it has had a huge impact in our society. The bursaries that we give to orphans and other vulnerable people in society have helped them to achieve their goals. Thank you, Hon. Deputy Speaker. God bless Kenya."
}