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{
    "id": 1229945,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1229945/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 178,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Dagoretti South, UDA",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. John Kiarie",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": " Thank you very much, Hon. Temporary Speaker, for this opportunity. It would be sacrilegious of me to start by not congratulating Hon. Gathoni Wamuchomba, the very hard-working Member of Parliament from Githunguri. Githunguri might not be too near to Dagoretti, but we are hearing about the work that is happening there and we are challenged and inspired. Hon. Gathoni, you are doing good for women leadership in this country. Beyond that, the people of Githunguri need to appreciate that you are a good representative in the House. This is not your first Motion, Hon. Gathoni, and I congratulate you for such a thoughtful Motion that you have presented before this House. Hon. Temporary Speaker, you and I were in class at the same time in university and among the many things that we learned was the history of education. When we studied the history of education, we appreciated the need for school uniforms and how it came to be that students wear them. One of the reasons was, of course, standardisation. The other one was identification. More importantly, however, is the effect of the war effort on standardising industries. Back then, early in the last century, young students were being prepared for the available market. Back then, they were going through the industrialisation revolution. At that time, they were talking about the coming of a production line that would standardise operations in a factory. It is now a century later and we are still debating about uniforms. Uniforms bring pride in belonging. They also institute discipline among the wearers. We have got to a point where uniforms have become a tool for magnifying the class divide, not only in schools, but also in a republic like Kenya where the divide between public and private schools is too big. Hon. Temporary Speaker, you have just recognised some students siting in the Speaker’s Gallery. I see them wearing school uniforms. One day on an afternoon in 1987, I was much younger than the students who are sitting in the Gallery today and I had been picked as one of the four students who would represent Kileleshwa Primary School in a programme called Junior Quiz. They would take the brightest students who would represent our division and take a quiz on television. Back then, we were in Westlands Division and not Dagoretti. On the day that I was supposed to go to the studio, the teacher recognised that I could not go to the studio in the school shorts I was wearing because I had two big “eyes” on my behind. The shorts that I was wearing were tired, torn, worn out and out of service because my parents could not afford to buy me another pair of pants. It was embarrassing. I remember that we had to go to the house of a student who lived nearby, his name was Eddy Wanje. Wherever 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."
}