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{
"id": 1278887,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1278887/?format=api",
"text_counter": 288,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Suba North, ODM",
"speaker_title": "Hon. Millie Odhiambo-Mabona",
"speaker": null,
"content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Speaker for giving me this opportunity. I thank Hon. Geoffrey for this Motion. I hope to be brief because we only have five minutes. My concern, after listening to Hon. Geoffrey Ruku and the Chairperson of the Departmental Committee on Education and Research, is that I got more confused than I got answers. If, as a Member of Parliament representing my constituency, I am confused about this model, how much more are my constituents going to be confused? Listening to Hon. Geoffrey Ruku, I see many challenges with this model. On one hand, they are saying that it is a better model through which more students will access education. I agree with Hon. Geoffrey Ruku that we must ensure that if the subsidy has been removed, it means that there is a category of students who will pay the full amount of fees that they were not paying previously. So, in effect it means that the fees has been increased for that category of students. Most of the students in that category are going to drop out, even from the technical colleges. That is very worrisome because, as a country, we need to be producing doctors, nurses and other personnel in specialised fields. It is of grave concern if we have a system that is going to exclude people. Speaking as a lawyer, I want to raise concern about the use of certain terms. I do not want to say carelessly, but when you say “vulnerable,” “needy,” “less needy,” and “extremely needy,” I do not understand these categorisations. Even from that alone, I do not know the legal framework that we are using to refer to a student as “needy.” At this point, I would not mind to be informed after I sit down so that you do not eat into my time. Is there a legal framework defining who is vulnerable? If there is no legal framework, then I can assure you that if I had a child, with corruption in this country, my child would be very vulnerable. In fact, I would even add another adjective to say “extremely” vulnerable because this is Kenya. We know what Kenya and corruption are. Corruption is our middle name as a country. As much as we are saying that we are committed to eradicating corruption, it will take us many years to do so. For me the issue is the absence of a legal framework categorising the level of need by students. I am also very concerned about what the Chairman has agreed with Hon. Geoffrey - that, because of lack of public participation, most people are not aware of this information. Talking as a Member of Parliament who represents a rural constituency, we even have a challenge getting people out to access bursary, which is open to everybody at the constituency level. Almost everybody, let me say, in the constituency, knows about bursary. During the time I was campaigning, I found a young man who had mean score “A” and had been admitted to the University of Nairobi. He hails from a place called Usao in my constituency, which is one of the far-flung areas of my constituency. He had deferred his studies for one year, not being aware that he could have come and asked for bursary. Now you are telling this guy in Usao, where there is no digital hub, to go get and use a computer to give information. Let us be realistic about the country we are living in. We have many people who 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."
}