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"speaker_name": "Mr. Poghisio",
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"content": "Thank you very much, Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir. I would like to begin by thanking the Mover of this Motion, Mr. Karaba, and my colleagues, who have made their contributions to the Motion. I would like to congratulate all of them for their support to this Motion. This is simply a Motion to get the attention of the Government. I am glad the Assistant Minister for Education is here to draw to the attention of the Government the need to address the issue of secondary education in this country. We can all report from our constituencies how many students have dropped out of school and how many are kicked out of school just before any examinations because they have not paid their fees. These students go home as long as the head teacher has asked them to go and many times, they go back to school and fail the examinations because they were not in school during the preparations for those examinations. 3024 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES August 8, 2007 Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I am appealing to the Minister to seriously consider following in the footsteps of the various requests that have been made here. This Motion urges the Minister to start an Education Levy Fund or such other fund as he deems fit to assist students from poor backgrounds. As the Bible says, the poor are with us. They are always here with us. It does not matter which environment we find ourselves in, but always there will be people in need. Hopefully, we will establish the Education Levy Fund as proposed. I propose that whatever fund is formed, be constituency-based. This is because it is only in the constituencies that the poor and the vulnerable can be identified. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I would like to give a case in point. There is a lot of enrolment now in primary schools, especially in areas which hitherto had not started sending children to school. Since our primary education only lasts for eight years, it is only a matter of time before these children go to secondary schools. So, it is only proper that the Minister begins to prepare for an explosion in the secondary school sector. Right now, we have few secondary schools and they have smaller classes. Let us give ourselves, perhaps 10 years and we will see the effect. This is not something that needs scientific extrapolation. We will soon find that our secondary schools will be fewer with smaller classrooms. Therefore, we will not have enough space for students. So, we had better prepare now for that kind of situation. I am asking the Minister look into the possibility of supporting this Motion. He should use it as the basis for creating other funds for establishment and expansion of secondary schools, so that we have room for more students. That goes hand in hand with recruitment of teachers. Right now, the process of recruiting secondary school teachers is very slow. The Ministry is only replacing those who have left the service for one reason or another. We need to bring back education in our universities to the centre-stage with regards to the courses taken there. At the moment, many university students feel that the education is not being given the credibility that it deserves. Many of them are beginning to change their courses. They are not thinking in terms of education being the key to improving their lives. Let us strengthen the faculties of education by creating incentives to allow students to apply to become teachers. Right now, many of those who apply are not assured of jobs, so they are changing their professions. The Ministry must prepare to face a crisis in the next ten years. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, the proposal for Mr. Karaba is to create a fund. This can be such a big fund as to assist the Ministry to sort out some of the problems that are likely to come. At the moment, the Ministry is thinking in terms of reducing the cost of secondary education. The way the Minister is going about this matter is not one that will guarantee equity and that the poor and the vulnerable will be identified. The best thing is to have a fund, like this one, which will go to those students from poor families. Many times, headteachers in our schools are not creative enough. If there are students who are from very poor background, why can the headteachers not find a way of allowing them to continue learning and keeping them during the holidays to do some work for the school? Why do they not create some kind of work study where the school can generate the kind of work that is commensurate with the fees for the students to do? A lot of these schools have farms and others may have to find some income-generating activities for these students to work. They can have these students do community service, so that they can continue with their education. A lot of the times, the fees being charged are so little. You will find that somebody is being sent home for a whole month because he owes the school Kshs3,000 or Kshs5,000 and he is, probably, a Form Four student. The student keeps going home and comes back to struggle. As a result, he never catches up with the rest of his friends. Why can our headteachers not be creative so that students from poor families can be retained and be made to compensate for the fees by working for the school. They can work in the library, kitchen or areas August 8, 2007 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 3025 where they can provide service which will be converted into fees. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, it really bothers me because in the case of Kacheliba Constituency where we have very few children going to secondary school. However, most of the time, they are at home. Take the case of pastoralists whose livelihood depends on livestock. Livestock is so precarious at the moment. With the drought, shortage of water and the cultural trap that is in the mind of the pastoralists, they may not be able to sell their livestock. These are the things that affect pastoral communities. So, they are willing to send their children to school, but how do they get fees? The idea that you have sold two cows this term and the next term comes so quickly, they cannot catch up with that. Theirs is a very precarious economy. We have a long way to go to try and turn these people around to come to a place where they can diversify their economy and have other sources of income. That is the process that is not in the Minister's docket. At least, it is something that we should be concerned about. How do we assist these people so that they can diversify their sources of income and send their children to school? In the meantime, this kind of fund would come in and would assist to send their children to secondary school. Right now, there is a case in point in Pokot North District. The Provincial Administration is literally forcing children to go to school. This has resulted in having a different class of children. Some of them are older than the normal school-going children because they are just being brought from the village to go to school. It is becoming a problem because we have to establish a different class and have different teachers at the primary level. I wish that the Ministry would address the issue of free primary education which is creating an influx of children in schools. We need a different class for people who join class later on and cannot catch up with the others. There will be a re-alignment of education. Let us not look at education any more the way we have looked at it before. Let us try to create an educational system that is relevant to communities. In the nomadic communities, I suggest that education become nomadic as well. This has been tried in Uganda. Nomadic education is education that follows people. It is designed for them. Not all education should take place in the classrooms. We should design education that is relevant to mobile communities and for places where there is insecurity. Sometimes, students are safer in their homes than being in school. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I would like to suggest that this Motion be supported. The Government must support it so that we have a fund that will be used to support children from poor and vulnerable communities. With those few remarks, I beg to support."
}