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{
    "id": 1271695,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1271695/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 226,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Cheruiyot",
    "speaker_title": "The Senate Majority Leader",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13165,
        "legal_name": "Aaron Kipkirui Cheruiyot",
        "slug": "aaron-cheruiyot"
    },
    "content": "behalf of the Senate representing the Road, Transportation, and Housing Committee,’ what questions will you be asked? Out of five questions that the members of the public will ask you is what is likely to take a center stage? I think any public meeting today on transport-related issues will not end. At least, each of the three first five speakers will speak on this topic of road safety. The fact that we continue to lose almost 5,000 Kenyans each and every year in a civilized society, is completely unacceptable. The statistics continue to grow. I expected this Committee to tell us what we can do even as we build better roads, without changing our ways and without the Government giving us the proper response on what we can do, so that we stop losing lives of our citizens on the road. I hope as they retreat to continue and carry on with their duties, that they will update this House and the country on how specifically they are holding the National Transport and Safety Authority and their Cabinet Secretary to account, so that we can reduce on the statistics. Each and every civilized country has succeeded by way of technology, road signages and so many other things to bring down the statistics. It is only in the developing world, Kenya being one of them, that we continue to see this problem. I have a strong feeling that more needs to be done. I hope the Committee on Roads, Transportation and Housing, who are here this afternoon are listening. Consequently, in the next quarter, as they do an update, they will tell us what measures have been put in place. I have seen policy pronouncements by Hon. Murkomen, the Cabinet Secretary in charge of Transport. However, as a House that is charged with the mandate of oversight, we should hold this Cabinet Secretary to action. Compare what they say in public to what is actually happening, so that we know for sure that a lot is being done. I say this because last month, the people of Kericho were visited by a heavy tragedy. We lost more than 50 Kenyans in one go due to a traffic accident. I hope that this Committee, in honour of such victims and many other Kenyans that continue to lose their lives through no fault of their own, just because we have not been properly organised around the road safety topic, can ensure that Kenyans feel that their Government understands the challenges that they are going through. Finally, there is a very interesting case that the Committee on Trade and Investments has presented to this House. This must be the Senate or the Parliament that breaks the new barriers in legislation. One of the things I enjoy doing is sometimes watching other parliaments on the kind of work that they do. I enjoyed watching the post- COVID-19 trials that used to happen in the Senate of the United States in 2021. Perhaps, I took a particular interest in Sen. Elizabeth Warren taking on bank Chief Executive Officers (CEOs), specifically the Wells Fargo CEO. The kind of exchange that they had was holding them to account for what they were doing to individual citizens during the COVID-19 period and pre-that period. At that particular time, the bank executives tried pleading with the all-mighty quoted phrase by corporates. They were saying that their Government should be able to"
}