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"id": 1451708,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1451708/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Nairobi County, ODM",
"speaker_title": "Hon. Esther Passaris",
"speaker": null,
"content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Speaker. I stand corrected. I meant when a Member of Parliament knows that he has over 300,000 students in school, that money will be insufficient because the allocation is not done fairly. If the Fund uses one man, one vote, one shilling, he will get sufficient money to build classrooms or demand that the Ministry of Education also builds classrooms. We need equity so that everyone can benefit. Members of Parliament, just like CWAs, are patrons. We are not involved in the absolute running of the Fund. I think it is important for us to call for free secondary education and not increased allocation of bursaries in the NG-CDF or NGAAF kitty. If we give unemployment benefits, then the Ksh1,000 contribution by the parents will be sufficient. As for Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) loans for universities and colleges, we should allow the parents to pay, maybe, Ksh1,500. HELB is a repayable loan, but if there are no jobs, it will collapse. I believe we need a holistic approach of dealing with things. In as much as I am not a member of the Departmental Committee on Education and Research or the Departmental Committee on Labour or the Social Protection Committee, I will start being a friend of those committees because I want to ask these hard questions. We need free secondary and primary education. There are some schools where performance is mediocre. Students in those schools have no hope at all because they are sent home and their performance is mediocre. If teachers cannot produce students with good grades, they should be fired. You cannot have a school with a mean score of four and you have no reason why the school is performing so badly. If you take your clever child to a school where performance is so mediocre, then that child has no chance in life. We need to look at our society and our issues holistically. When it comes to corruption, which is the biggest elephant in the room and the main reason for the Gen Z revolution right now, we need to make sure that the country and Parliament looks at all the oversight reports. If there have not been prosecutions, we should make sure that we highlight that. Right now, we are looked at as the enemy. We are looked at as the ones who are not doing the right thing, but I know there are so many reports which have called for prosecution and highlighted corruption and rot in various public entities and Ministries, and nothing has been done about it. The Executive needs to give amnesty, collect the money and redirect it for education, health, food security and job creation. 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."
}