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"id": 195491,
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Prof. Olweny",
"speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister for Education",
"speaker": {
"id": 122,
"legal_name": "Patrick Ayiecho Olweny",
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"content": " Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. I beg to support the Motion that has been presented by the Minister for Finance. We need to support the Minister because today, many Government departments especially in the districts, are having problems to operate due to lack of money. I remember recently, I had to get out some money from our CDF kitty to help repair a vehicle of one of our DOs in my constituency. They do not have enough money at the moment. I know that the country has had a lot of problems since last year's elections. We are in a very unique situation in the history of this country where we had an election and after that, terrible things happened. There was serious chaos and people killed one another. A lot of property that had been acquired over a long time was destroyed and even Government offices, in my district, offices that belonged to the Ministry of Agriculture were burnt down and wiped out completely. The same thing happened to those of the Ministry of Water and Irrigation. Therefore, some of these officers have nowhere to operate from. They are actually refugees in other departments. Therefore, they need money. It is mandatory that we support the Minister here so that he can get some money that he can give out to Government departments to operate. I hope we will never see the kind of destruction that we saw again in the history of this country. It was terrible! Look at what happened to schools in some parts of this country; many of them were burnt down. That means that, in many places, students and pupils have nowhere to learn. So, the Ministry of Education needs special support in many areas. It needs special attention. I do not know whether this kind of support would come from the Ministry of State for Special Programmes or directly from the Ministry of Education. If it is to come directly from the Ministry of Education, then we need more money to be allocated in future for emergency support to schools. We have not had much. Previously, we have been having disasters occurring in schools; winds blowing off roofs and schools getting burnt, but we have not had a lot of support. I do not think that the Government had put aside enough money for emergency support. I think this time we have learnt some lessons. In future, we should have a budget for that purpose so that, in case there are problems in schools, we have some emergency support which can be used to reconstruct the buildings that get destroyed by storms or arsonists. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we have a unique situation of refugees within our country; the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). We have them in camps. It is a terrible thing for us and I hope the leaders--- When we talk of \"leaders\", we do not mean hon. Members only. Leaders include community leaders, religious leaders and administration leaders among others. The Members of Parliament are most of the time here. However, if you go down to the constituencies, you will find a different situation. These are some of the things which we need to look into. Let us involve everybody and not hon. Members only. Sometimes hon. Members may oppose an idea but if you go down to the grassroots level, you will find that the story is different and wananchi are willing to live with their neighbours. The hon. Member may be complaining about what he has received or what he has not received and why he does not want IDPs in his constituency. That will happen. However, let us involve leaders from the grassroots level and you will notice a different picture. Enough money should be allocated to the Ministry of State for Special Programmes so that it can be given to the IDPs. Let us also give enough money to the Ministry of Agriculture because we will be faced with famine in this country. The IDPs who are today in camps are the farmers. Most of the land will not be cultivated and no crop will be planted. There is need for special attention and support to these farmers. Something has to be done. There is need to offer them security if at all some of them are to return to their farms. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, when we talk about IDPs today - of course it is a creation of what happened after the elections - we have in mind only those people in camps. Last 804 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES April 30, 2008 weekend when I went home, I found IDPs living with my mother, an elderly woman. She has a big family which was chased away from somewhere in Central Province living with her. The father of the family is staying somewhere else while his wife and children are living with my mother. I found out that on Friday. On Saturday morning, somebody came to me and told me that he had come from Limuru and was staying in a small shanty in the village and had no support. His wife and children are also staying in another district. When we talk about IDPs, we should know that there are some people suffering outside there. People whom we thought went back to their homes actually have no homes. They are living with other people, who are not necessarily their relatives and the families are living apart. They have no homes and resources to support them. These are people whose problems need to be addressed. Someone said that IDPs should go back to their homes because they had previously left their homes. Just like the ones living in camps, their homes were burnt down. They will go back to their ancestral land because their homes were burnt down. Those whom we claim went back to their homes went to their ancestral land. That land now belongs to someone else. These people had settled elsewhere. They had bought land elsewhere. However, there are certain communities that will always accept the people who came from their families. However, they cannot give them land. They can only give them temporary accommodation. So, the Government must address the problems of these people. They are just cohabiting with their relatives for the time being. However, those relatives will get fed up with them and chase them away. I noted that problem when I visited my constituency over the weekend. In fact, many of them are still coming to my constituency. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, again, with regard to agricultural sector, I want to address myself to the sugar industry which is my pet subject. What really happened to the sugar industry during the elections? Did it mean that when we went for the elections the corrupt people who always interfered with the sugar industry were let loose? Everything that hon. Kirwa put under control got disorganised and everything now is in chaos. A good example is privatisation of Miwani Sugar Company. How on earth could a court of law in this country issue an order that the company be auctioned on 24th December when the whole country was campaigning for elections? It was auctioned on the same day. The Minister for Finance and the Minister for Agriculture should give us an explanation as to what happened. Imagine somebody bid to buy Miwani Sugar Company, but all of a sudden, he is told somebody else paid money to an auctioneer and he took the management of Miwani Sugar Factory. It is wrong and immoral. I beg support the Motion."
}