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"id": 206820,
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"speaker_name": "Mr. Kipchumba",
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"content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. I also wish to support the Vote for this very important Ministry. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, in some countries of the world, especially the super powers, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is, in fact, probably the second most important after the Office of the President. But in this country, it is probably not in the top ten and, rightly so, when you look at the budget allocation to this Ministry. It is a reflection of the expectations that have been perceived to accrue from that particular Ministry. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I think we should re-look at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a very different direction. It is a Ministry which, if it is funded properly, this country would reap quite some benefits. We take it just as part of the other Ministries. It is time to re-focus on what we really want to achieve by having a Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, many hon. Members here will always talk about the Ministry of Agriculture or certain other Ministries that are within their localities. But they forget that, indeed, this Ministry--- When Members of Parliament travel all over the world, together with Kenyans who live outside, we are bound to reap quite a lot of benefits if we fund this Ministry, as it were, as perceived by other countries. Therefore, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, it is incumbent upon the Ministry itself to lobby for more funding. I do not know who the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is lumped up with. The Minister should move it a step further to join the Ministries that we perceive to be very important to us. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, if we could have a functional East African Community, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania could reap a lot of benefits. We could all join hands and ensure that, instead of all of us opening embassies in various countries, for example, Germany, we could open only one embassy so that we could reduce expenditure on rent and personnel. That way, we will not compete for the same services for the same countries. That is, probably, an area that the Ministry could consider. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, one of the reasons why I would like the East African Community to be fast-tracked is for Ministries, such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to operate at the same level in figure. I know that now, we are not yet there. But I think if we could all have one Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the three countries, probably with one ambassador and some employees serving the same country, I think we can save quite a lot of money. Can you imagine how much money this country pays to have a foreign embassy in a city like London? Uganda and Tanzania could benefit from the same services that are offered by the same employees. I think we could, as countries within this locality, focus on such serious ventures. We can make a lot of savings. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, many a time, when you meet many of those employees in our foreign embassies, their salaries are actually pegged to the dollar. It does not make a lot of sense to somebody who is in a Scandinavian country to peg his or her salary to the dollar. That should only apply to those employees that work in America! So, employees who work in each respective country should have their salaries calculated as per the currency of those 3498 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES August 28, 2007 countries. When the Euro is very strong and you are paying our employees in dollars, they are quite disadvantaged! They operate to the extent that they are unable to finance themselves in those countries. Therefore, we would like this Ministry to re-look at that issue. How do we remunerate our officers in various countries, including raising their salaries and allowances? We should peg their salaries to the currencies of their respective countries. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the other issue that I find very interesting is our inability to purchase the various buildings in those countries. We have a building in Namibia from which we get a lot of rent. I noticed when we travelled there, a country can benefit quite a lot by having its own buildings. We should not continue paying a lot of rent. In fact, Uganda, during the reign of Idi Amin, benefited a lot by ensuring that she purchased buildings in other countries, including our own country. Right now, those buildings are worth quite a lot of money. Instead of us paying rent continuously, which costs a lot of money, especially in foreign countries, we could budget continuously for the next few years, so that we can buy our own buildings and make some savings. Renovation has not been done for sometime on many of our buildings in foreign countries, although, now something is being done in embassies like the one in America. But we, as a country, must ensure that we allocate some money in our Budget for renovation of our buildings in foreign countries. I think we take it as a secondary issue, but it is very critical. The image of this country must be portrayed in the right way. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I have seen officers from the National Security Intelligence Service (NSIS) working in our embassies abroad. I cannot quite remember how they are referred to. Why do we have intelligence officers in embassies like the ones in Zambia, Malawi, Ghana, and so on? What do we want to know in countries which are of little importance to us? They may be of value in other sectors, but what intelligence do we want to get from such countries? Some of these intelligence officers that we send to some countries do not even understand the language that is spoken there, yet, we expect some intelligence information from them. How can they get intelligence information when they do not even understand the language that is spoken there? If we really need to have intelligence officers in those embassies, first, we must know their job description; whether they have the capacity to get any intelligence information in those countries. Secondly, we must know what value we need from that intelligence that they have gathered. If they are unable to get intelligence information on the Mungiki sect in this country, why would we imagine that one intelligence officer can get intelligence information in a foreign country? First, they face language problem. Secondly, probably, they are under-funded. Thirdly, their intelligence information is of no use to us. Therefore, I want to suggest to this Ministry that some of the departments that they think are important to us are actually not of any value. Therefore, let us reduce those officers that are supposed to give us certain political intelligence information and, probably, increase those officers that are supposed to do business and gather information on trade. This is because the world now is a village. Therefore, there are very few things that, probably, the whole world does not desire others to know. If it is a military plane, for example, everybody knows its specifications. There are just small variations. Even the Navy ships that we talk about, they are no longer of any intelligence values. For us to reduce expenditure on this, I would want to request that we leave those officers to stay in Kenya and get intelligence on Mungiki and such other groups. I would like to request the Ministry to ensure that the people who are employed as ambassadors must have worked in that Ministry. They must be people who have progressively rose through the ranks in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It is not good to just appoint somebody from the village as ambassador, just because when he was a District Commissioner (DC), he did a political job for you in a certain district. This is because the other officers in the Ministry feel very discouraged in the sense that a fellow who was just a mere DC, with very little experience and August 28, 2007 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 3499 information on how to run embassies, has been appointed ambassador. There should be qualifications for ambassadorship. I would want, in future, to see specifications or qualifications of our ambassadors, so that people who do not qualify to be ambassadors, do not get the very good title of \"ambassador\", which stays with that person forever. Therefore, let us not misuse it. Let us appoint people who have risen through the ranks in the various Ministries, appointed to those positions. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, with those few remarks, I beg to support."
}