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{
    "id": 216912,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/216912/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 169,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Mukiri",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 334,
        "legal_name": "Mukiri Macharia",
        "slug": "mukiri-macharia"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir. Now that the Minister for Finance is here, I would like to reiterate that we are happy because he has put in some money to salvage the pyrethrum industry. But I wish to tell the Minister that, that money is not enough. That is an industry that has been mismanaged. It is like a business and the Government needs to invest in it. That way, it can go back to the earlier years where it was a big foreign exchange earner for this country. I hope the Minister will, this time round, look for money to salvage that industry. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I was submitting on the issue of our universities. Mr. Speaker, Sir, universities are supposed to be centres of excellence. Our universities are supposed to be centres for research. The Government should think seriously about putting more money in the universities. If you go to the universities today, the infrastructure is completely broken down and our lecturers are not teaching the way they used to teach before because they keep on going for contracts outside. That is why you are seeing that there are so many affiliate colleges that are coming up in the universities. That is because the universities are suffering from budgetary constraints and they are not able to meet their needs. That affects the value of education. They are devaluing our education by opening up several affiliate colleges. I hope that the Government will address the issue of our universities because if we do not do that, then our education standards will fall down and will continue going down. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I want to urge the Minister for Environment and Natural Resources to take the issue of planting trees seriously. I know that the Minister for Environment and Natural Resources is very busy because he holds two dockets. If you come to my constituency, there are areas where there was forest cover before but the trees were harvested. Unfortunately, for the last June 27, 2007 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 2099 four years that I have been in Parliament, I have not seen any action. The Minister should undertake, as his basic duty, to increase the forest cover in this country. The forest cover has gone very low and nothing is being done. They should take cue from the persons who are in charge of the Nairobi City Council (NCC). We are seeing a lot of afforestation going on in the City of Nairobi but outside Nairobi, nothing is happening. We hope that the Government will take the issue of tree-planting seriously and that the forest cover is going to be increased. Mr. Speaker, Sir, regarding the issue of courts, there seems to be a big problem in the judiciary, and especially in the handling of cases. I think that it is time that the Government now tried to give the judiciary a separate budget so that they are able to charge their needs directly to the Consolidated Fund. There seems to be a lot of problems. There are so many cases which are not going on because of the problem of the magistrates not proceeding with matters because of frustrations. The Government promised that it was going to increase the salaries of the magistrates but that has not happened. Therefore, what has been happening is that, when you go the court in the morning, magistrates keep on adjourning matters. That is causing a lot of injustice to the people of this country. With those few remarks, I beg to support."
}