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"id": 214522,
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"speaker_name": "Prof. Maathai",
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"id": 226,
"legal_name": "Wangari Muta Maathai",
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"content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, thank you for giving me an opportunity to contribute to this Motion and thank Mr. Ojode for bringing it forward. This Motion reflects the many comments that have been made in this House in support of our policemen and policewomen. So, it is very timely or even long overdue, that we should have a law that should protect and ensure that our policemen are taken care of. I want to express my sorrow for the policemen who lose their lives in the course of duty and then their families find themselves completely unsupported, forgotten and have to go back to their rural areas to suffer in silence. It is very important that the Government puts in place a mechanism that ensures that families of policemen and policewomen are taken care of. In any society where there is inequity, there will always be crime. Kenya is rated as the most unequal society in the world. We have few people who are extremely wealthy and a majority who are extremely poor. There is nothing to be proud of in having large slums like Mathare and Kibera where many of our children are raised in an environment that allows misuse of drugs and substances; and in an environment that allows children to grow with a deep sense of disrespect. When those children eventually, through the efforts of their parents, go to school, they cannot find employment. They stay in those circumstances and eventually organize themselves into gangs. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I know that we speak about crime. Life in crime has recently been associated with organized crimes in form of what we are calling gangs. But these gangs are made up of our children. If these children have ended up being organized criminals, there is something that we have to ask ourselves, as parents and leaders. What have we not done in our society to allow our children to grow up to become people who are willing to cut our throats and kill each other? It should have been completely unnecessary for policemen to be pursuing youngsters and shooting them. The policemen are not supposed to be shooting young people, and quite often, without being able to avoid shooting innocent people. I think this is something that must disturb the hon. Members of this House. This is because we are the lawmakers, parents and Government. We should be unwilling to accept a situation where we allow our policemen and children to face and kill each other with guns. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, quite often, I am very much disturbed by the disrespect that I see when people are killed in this country. I have said this before, and I want to repeat it; that I do not know why we parade bodies of the dead on televisions, in front of our children, as if it is something to celebrate about. We call the dead all kind of names, be it gangs, misguided elements, or whatever names we give them. But I have a feeling that we have lost a sense of self-respect and compassion. I think that even if one is dead, he or she deserves to be treated with a certain amount of respect. I think that we actually help to create an environment in which crime is perpetuated, by exposing this kind of violence to our children. When I see the July 11, 2007 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 2423 policemen parading dead people and they tell us that they had guns, and then they are thrown into police vans, as if they were not human beings--- When I see children watching those scenes, I ask myself: How will those children grow up to become responsible citizens? Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, yesterday, hon. ole Ntimama mentioned that we have failed, as a people and Government, to change the kind of Provincial Administration that we inherited from the British Government. I am quite sure that top officers in the police force live quite happily, because they represent the levels that were occupied by the British administrators. It is the police officers in the lower level who live in shanties. Two police officers share a room, even when they are married, because their level was made up of Africans during the colonial administration. I cannot understand why we continue to have the same system. We have not changed that mentality. To me, it reflects a certain amount of attitude that we have; where we continue not to encourage and inculcate a sense of culture, respect and passing value, not only in our society, but also in the police force. I think that the police force needs to be encouraged to have respect and compassion. It also needs to be tender and stop being so disrespectful to those who are perceived to be the enemy. All those who died; those who are pursuing, and being pursued, are Kenyans. When this Motion is finally passed into law, I would very much like to see our policemen being treated with a lot of respect. We should protect their families and teach them, during their training, to respect their fellow Kenyans, even when they are dead. Those of us who are in power should also promote equity in our country, so that we eliminate the Mathares and Kiberas of this world, where these criminals and very negative elements of our lives are cultivated. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, recently in my own constituency, I visited the local police station and noticed that they are operating in a very dilapidated building. I also think that we, as policemen or individuals, need to be able to take care of our environment. Just because we live in a dilapidated environment does not mean that we cannot plant some plants and flowers or fix a broken window. I do not think that police officers should allow themselves to be so powerless that they have to wait until the Provincial Police Officer (PPO) comes and does something to their environment. If the toilet is falling, surely, those are some of the things that they too can take care of. I feel that they have become so dependent on their seniors that even the little things that can help improve the environment in the areas they live are not done. With those remarks, I strongly support the Motion."
}