Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 19212,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/19212/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 288,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Wetangula",
    "speaker_title": "The Minister for Foreign Affairs",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 210,
        "legal_name": "Moses Masika Wetangula",
        "slug": "moses-wetangula"
    },
    "content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, one thing that we must appreciate in this country is that we have produced a lot of good engineers. If you go around the African continent, you will find economies of southern African countries – South Africa itself, Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi and closer home, Tanzania, actually run on the strength of Kenyan engineers. The chief engineer who led the construction of the entire infrastructure for the World Cup in South Africa was a Kenyan, and he did a wonderful job. If you go to the USA, you will find very consummate Kenyan engineers, all trained here, mastered out there and are doing a wonderful job. But I am afraid that you cannot say the same of our engineers here. Why are Kenyan engineers doing so much out there and so little back here? Look at our infrastructure. We vote for money here, construct roads and the road wears away before you even officially open it, yet their construction is supervised by our engineers. I think the regulation to control the work ethics and the commitment to excellence by engineers has been weak to the extent that nobody has been held to account and to take responsibility. You find an engineer routinely issuing a certificate of completion of every stage of a construction that, even to a layman like you and me in engineering, is shoddy. This country has had very serious accidents in the construction industry because of incompetence of some of our engineers. The Ronald Ngala Road structure was an example. We have had several structures crumbling like a pile of cards. There was the Nyamakima construction, and we have lost human lives. When you look at it, there was an engineer involved. When you look at it, there was an engineer involved, who issued a certificate with total abundance that what was being done was proper and correct. Most of those engineers have gotten away with it. They have not been disbarred from practicing their profession. It is only one case - I think of Ronald Ngala Street - where I saw the engineer in court. I do not know how the case ended. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, those are the ones we see. But there are the ones that we do not see. There are the bad roads. In your constituency, you give a contract to grade and murram a road and they put mud on the road and walk away. The engineer signs the certificate and money is paid. In my own constituency, there is a road running from Bungoma through Kanduyi, Sirisia, Webuye up to Kimilili. We are waiting for the President to come and officially open it. But it is worn out as if it is ten years old. The Government has sunk in that road Kshs900 million. There is a road from Butere down to Yala. It has not been opened and yet, it is worn out. The Government has sunk in that road close to Kshs1 billion. You can count many such roads."
}