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{
    "id": 1272504,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1272504/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 301,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Kericho County, UDA",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Beatrice Kemei",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "I support Hon. Chairperson. The EAC is very important to us. We should not forget that when we sing our National Anthem, it is followed by the EAC Anthem. That tells us that the EAC is very important. It consists of 300,000,000 citizens. Twenty two per cent live in urban centres with a land area of 4.8 million square kilometres. According to the statistics in 2019, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of EAC is 240 billion. More member states are joining the EAC. I am happy and appreciate that Kenya is considered a big brother in the EAC. Other member states are the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Republic of Burundi, the Republic of Rwanda, the Republic of South Sudan, the Republic of Uganda, and the United Republic of Tanzania. From what our Chairperson has told us, the EAC has autonomous institutions like the East African Court of Justice and the East African Common Market. I also appreciate the East African Common Market as one of the pillars of EAC. The activities are the issuance of the new international e-passport that came into place in 2019. Hon. Temporary Speaker, we can move freely within Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. Free movement of persons, hawkers, labourers, services, and capital across the East African Community is important to us. The East African Legislative Assembly is key. We have sent Members there to represent us. The many issues, cases and legislations they handle are key. However, we did not find Members because the sittings were being held in Burundi. We visited their beautiful and interesting Assembly. Hopefully, we will find them sitting there or in Kenya next time. I wish to appreciate the East African Community Secretariat and observe the challenges it is currently facing. There is financial shortage which is occasioned by the delay in remittances by member states, thus slowing down sittings, transactions of business and programmes in the Assembly. The free movement of East African-originating goods is frustrating. Persistence of Monopolistic Trade Tendencies (MTPs) even after 16 years of implementation is not good for our region. The trade between the East African countries is low. The intra-East Africa trade is at 10 per cent while international trade accounts for 90 per cent of East African trade. Does it mean we do not trust the products and goods that we have amongst ourselves? Instead, we want to get goods from other countries. The member countries should pull up their socks. Kenya being the big brother, should always show the way. The Ministry that Hon. Chair has spoken about should work harder and be felt in the East African Community."
}