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{
    "id": 1202138,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1202138/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 29,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Soy, UDA",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. David Kiplagat",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Speaker, for giving me this time to proceed from where I left. I request the Chair to recount because of the interruptions of thought that I experienced. So, you can add me an extra minute. Before we took a break, I was thanking the President for that address. The Speech covered most of the areas that need to be covered for the economy to prosper. I had talked of Uasin-Gishu being an agricultural county; therefore, the subsidy on fertilizer is really welcome by the citizens of that county. In future, when the economy improves, we will call upon the Government to reduce the subsidy further to Ksh2,500. There is also need to streamline the Ministry of Agriculture. There are many cartels and brokers who make it hard for farmers to make a profit at the end of the day. I call upon the Ministry and this House to make legislation that will assist our farmers to get rid of those cartels and brokers. About three years ago, there was victimisation of farmers from Uasin-Gishu. I want to inform this House that, up to today, those farmers are still suffering. They were taken through prosecutions and their money is being held by the Government. We are calling upon the new Government to release those monies to those farmers because they were victimised and yet, they were not importers from Mexico. They were real farmers and their farms can be confirmed. They have also sent me to ensure that, that money amounting to Kshs1 billion is released. That money will improve their conditions of farming. Thirdly, there is the issue of energy. I know the Speech did not cover a lot in terms of energy but, that is a very critical component and it contributes to the challenges that our people are facing. You know very well that the Government had tried on the issue of the Last Mile Connectivity, where there was supposed to be maximisation on all the transformers that were already in place. I want to call upon this House to set up policies and regulations that are going to ensure that every transformer that has been installed is maximised within 100 days. It will assist to jump-start the process of alleviating the suffering that our people are going through. On the issue of the economy and debt, I support the President. We need to have austerity measures so that we can get money that is going to jump-start this economy. We can get the Kshs300 billion within our current Budget by ensuring that we do away with things like travels, flowers and tea that are not important to the people of Kenya and the economic development of this country. Part of the money should be injected into the Hustlers Fund and other funds that are necessary to jump-start this economy. At the end of the day, we cannot continue digging a hole to fill another one. We cannot continue borrowing to sustain our economy. We were being told that currently, the ordinary revenue is about Kshs2 trillion and the current debt that we are paying is about Kshs1.4 trillion. If you do your simple mathematics, it follows that you remain with around Kshs600 billion. That is not enough and this means that this economy is being run on debts. It is important that we cut it and we support the President so that, within three years, at least, we are in a sustainable level that we can develop our country without huge debts. 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."
}