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{
    "id": 1473319,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1473319/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 410,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Oketch Gicheru",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "For you to scientifically deal with fire disasters that we are seeing in Nairobi, perhaps it is not the same way you are going to deal with a fire that is happening in Migori County, which could be an issue of forest fires that are caused by charcoal burners. These cannot be vested in an authority. I am very disappointed with this Bill. It classifies terrorism as a human-caused disaster and then gives it to the Authority to deal with issues of counterterrorism. It is now the responsibility of the National Authority to figure out the nuance of dealing with terrorism, which is an issue that should be dealt with by the Ministry of Interior and National Administration, and the Ministry of Defense. How do you vest this in an Authority called National Disaster Management Authority? It defeats logic. My proposal would be to have a Ministry of Special Programmes. That Ministry should classify all departmental agencies that can deal with specific clusters of disaster that we are experiencing in this country and devise prompt and most modern ways of engaging with those that happen within our borders to the extent that we can have a cut- throat strategy, operationally, to respond to disasters in this country. We saw during floods people running helter-skelter. There was this notion that you feel like if floods were happening in the country, then the order of response must come from the presidency and trickle down to all Members of the County Assembly (MCAs) and then to the governors. We saw some of the worst responses to serious issues of floods in this country. If they were left to ministerial departments and to some extent to several counties to devise their ways of dealing with disasters that come in their area, I believe that we could have had a very proper response and apt operation to not only deal with the response mechanisms to some of these issues but even recovery. Even with recovery, you will understand that when disasters happen in this country, the political notion of responding to them immediately with some kind of bravado and public relations (PR) mechanisms to the extent that within that one week that a disaster happens, everybody is active including the President, governors and every politician. Everybody is talking about it. Even corporations are active raising money to respond. However, what happens to the true recovery of people who have been faced with those disasters? Are we able to speak authoritatively to the fact that the lives of those who were affected by the floods in Tana River County are better because of response that we had in this country? Are we able to speak authoritatively about families that were affected by serious floods in Nyatike Constituency in Migori County in places like Kaputo or Luanda where I come from? Just because the Government responded by giving them some donations in terms of food, blankets and a few things here and there, has that solved their problems from the impact of those floods? Are we able to say authoritatively that from floods that we faced in Budalangi, which we keep on facing year-in, year-out, because of the simple collective national response that we have of giving people response mechanisms and charitable goods like food and blankets, their lives are better? No, they are not. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
}