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"id": 197185,
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"speaker_name": "Mr. Onyancha",
"speaker_title": "The Member for Bonchari",
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"legal_name": "Charles Onyancha",
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"content": " Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, thank you very much. My name is Charles Onyancha from Bonchari Constituency, and I take this opportunity to thank you for giving me this chance to speak for the first time. I wish to first of all, congratulate His Excellency the President, Mr. Kibaki and His Excellency, Mr. Raila, for arriving at an accord which saved our country from imminent disaster. The establishment of the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission, which is imminent, and the proposed Ethnic Relations Bill will go a long way in healing the wounds of this country, which are the result of injustices which started before Independence. Those injustices were started by the colonial government, which 340 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES March 20, 2008 snatched land from its worthy owners, and subsequently were caused by our fellow Kenyans at Independence. They took huge tracts of land, some of which are larger than Nyanza Province, some for one individual, while so many of their own countrymen or tribesmen owned nothing; so, people were displaced or died fighting for land. Those are the injustices which will be corrected by the Bills, which will come into this august House. I wish to congratulate His Excellency the President for remembering the issue of continued poverty in our country. The introduction of Sessional Papers and Bills on the dairy, poultry and fishing industries will directly address the needs of the common man. That is the purpose for which we were elected. Our constituents have suffered over the years from poverty, and unnecessarily so. Bonchari ranks number 205 out of 210 constituencies in the poverty index. It is for that reason that this topic is very dear to our hearts. We cannot continue living a lie. As a country we cannot continue living in two classes, the rich and the poor. We cannot continue pretending that Central Province with a poverty index of 31 per cent is richer than Nyanza Province with a poverty index of 64 per cent, when those in Central Province who make up that index of 31 per cent are fewer than 1000 people, and the other three million are really poor. We must address the issue of redistribution of wealth, starting with land. In that regard, I propose that this House takes this matter seriously and actually prioritises all the Bills, which will come here, and ensures that the redistribution of wealth happens during the life of the 10th Parliament. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, when I listened to His Excellency the President, I was carried away by his Address. He wished to address the issue of poverty. He also wished to introduce measures that would return this country to its proper path of development. I was impressed by the way the House accommodated those feelings. I am sure that if we continue in that spirit of unity, nothing will beat or defeat us, and we will achieve our goals. I fully support the President's Address. As regards development, I propose that we look into the issue of the railway network, because no country can develop without a proper and viable railway network across the country. We should start by rehabilitating the railway line that used to go up to Nanyuki, Nyandarua and many other areas. The Government should put money into the railway network to remove the burden from the road system, otherwise, as much as we might like to repair them, we shall be doing a job in futility, because the load that is transported on the roads cannot be sustained over a long period of time. If I may continue about poverty and development, many of the poor are people who are willing to work for their upkeep. But they do not have jobs to do so. Some of them, unfortunately, have large tracts of land but they are not willing to till them. I would like to propose a policy that ensures taxation of idle land so that, those who are willing to work on land can be allowed to do so. Those who are willing to be landlords can be landlords without holding land which is under- utilised. In that same vein, it saddened me to see some of our colleagues in the last Parliament not taking Parliament seriously. Parliament lacked quorum all the time. I hope that this Tenth Parliament will not see the recurrence of those shameful acts of missing Parliament and duty; pretending that you are a leader and showing the whole country that all we earn in Parliament is not deserved. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I would briefly like to touch on the issue of the Constituencies Development Fund (CDF) Act. It is my hope that we shall amend that Act to include assistance to churches. Church attendants and members are the taxpayers who contribute towards the kitty that, in the end, is used to support CDF. Towards that regard, I should also, in the same vein, raise concerns about the church. The church in Kenya largely failed the country. The March 20, 2008 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 341 church in Kenya showed that since pre-colonial times, it has not succeeded in its best aim of christianising and making people to be concerned about each other and obeying the commandment that says: \"Thou shall not kill.\" It is a shame that, that happened across the country. It is a shame that bishops and cardinals supported certain motions which were the result, at the end of the day, of what happened. I am a Catholic myself and I should, in the same vein, be very proud of the church in Kisii and the people of Kisii as a whole. When they were being killed in Eldoret, Nakuru, Naivasha, Thika, Nyeri - we were burying people from all areas - the people within Gusiiland who were from other ethnic communities were safe! That is because we, as leaders and the church, issued a fatwa that nobody shall be touched. I hope other leaders will do the same in future. That is because no community has suffered more from the ethnic clashes than the Omugusii . In that regard, I hope that when it comes to distributing any funds that are forthcoming, we shall be looked upon as a favoured community to resettle our people. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, may I conclude by saying this: Let us not be hypocrites. Let people not start blaming others about the ethnic clashes. Those were spontaneous clashes that arose as a result of the announcement of the Presidential elections. There is nothing else to it. Otherwise, they would not have been planned without the National Security Intelligence Service (NSIS) or the police knowing it. Unless we want to admit that we do not have those forces at all. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, it is a painful subject! But may I also add that corruption in this country has killed more people than those clashes. I want to call upon us, as Parliament and Government, that the issue of corruption be addressed. We should start from the top. The people involved should be taken to task about their activities. With those few remarks, I beg to support the Motion."
}