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"speaker_name": "Mr. Kagwima",
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"legal_name": "Francis Nyamu Kagwima",
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"content": "I apologise, Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. But this issue is very important and we need to address it if we want to retain the engineers in the public service. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the Ministry of Roads and Public Works is now terribly short of engineers. For example, the Minister will agree with me that the Bridges Unit is 1800 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES June 13, 2007 dead. It is obsolete, because the last time I visited that unit, I found two engineers who were due to retire. I do not know what has happened now because their time of retiring lapsed. The Minister should tell us what he has done with the unit. In this country, if you apply for a design of a bridge, it will take more than two years. If you depend on the money from the Ministry, by that time, that money will have been taken back to the Treasury. We are lucky that the Constituencies Development Fund (CDF) money is carried forward. I applied for designs of some bridges four years ago, but I had to hire private engineers to do the designs because I could not get them from the Ministry of Roads and Public Works. When you apply for approval of the designs, it takes another one year. We are now faced with the danger where bridges are not being inspected. A number of them can collapse at any time. They are supposed to be inspected to ensure that they are properly maintained. So, I would like to appeal to the Minister - and I hope that he is listening - to ensure that he revives the Bridges Unit. Unless we do that, the roads that we are constructing will be left with gaps as a result of the collapse of bridges. So, we need to employ new engineers and train them well. We should also pay them well. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, having said that, I also want to salute the fact that more money is being allocated to the rural access roads. I think we should allocate money to these roads every year, to ensure that the rural areas are developed. The economy will grow faster when people are producing more and the produce reaches the market. So, I support the fact that we have increased allocation to rural roads. But, we need to increase the supervision of roads. That is why we still require more engineers. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, in contracting for the construction of roads to bitumen standards, there are two components. First, you are told to construct a road as a contractor. Then, you are also told that you must maintain that road until the construction is completed. That is where the contractors and engineers take public money. This is because the issue of maintenance is not observed. We only await for the road to be constructed, yet, the contractor is also supposed to maintain it. That component is always ignored. I want to appeal to the Minister to instruct the engineers to ensure that the wananchi get the two components. As the construction continues, in the meantime, it is the responsibility of the contractor to ensure that, that section of the road that he is working on is also maintained and it is motorable. That is what the contract, under normal standards, says. Recently, some contractor was appointed to construct Road C92, Mate Road. Part \"b\" of the contract says what I have just said. But that road is impassable. It is under contract and the Government has pulled away from it. However, the contractor is not doing the maintenance part of the contract. If you drove through Ishiara, you would be shocked by the kind of stones that are on that road, yet it is on contract to be constructed to bitumen standards. So, I urge the Minister to address this issue and ensure that, that part \"b\" of the contract is also addressed. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I know that the Budget will be read tomorrow and, therefore, there is not much that we can do to change the figures. But, in future, the Minister requires to look across the country and find out which areas have not been funded reasonably, so that the distribution of funds is equitably done. There are parts of this country where children have only read about tarmac roads in books, but they have never seen them. The Minister should allocate money equitably, so that the wananchi of this country benefit. I am happy that the contract is on to construct a tarmac road in my constituency. It is going to be history because this will be the first tarmac road in that area. So, we need to shift from that old programme where the wazungu classified regions into high-potential and low-potential areas. As a result, they developed the high-potential areas first. Fortunately, when God created the world, each area was rewarded with something. If an area does not have coffee, for example, it has other resources that require to be tapped and opened to the rest of the world. So, if we can open the rest June 13, 2007 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 1801 of the country to investors--- We have areas where people can invest, so long as they are sure that they can access their investments. So, the Minister should look into this issue and ensure that those areas that have not benefited in the past, do so now. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I do not have to talk about the bypasses and flyovers, because my colleagues dwelt on them a great deal. But, this area is important, because the economy is suffering a great deal. People spend over four hours everyday in traffic jams. If you look at the time lost and the fuel that is consumed, that is a major portion of our economy that we are wasting. We need to move with speed and ensure that our people meet their appointments and reach their work places in good time. The time that we spend in traffic jam is much. Even over the weekends, there are traffic jams. I think we need to move with speed to ease these traffic jams. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, those who want to invest should be encouraged. Consessioning should be undertaken so that people can invest in roads, like they invest in buildings. I know that some Government offices are in rented buildings. We should also encourage people to invest in roads and recover their money. The Government should let them manage the roads for whatever periods, so long as finally, the roads will belong to us. In any case, even as they continue to recover their money, we will continue using the road. Countries like Malaysia and many others went that direction a long time ago. They have beautiful private roads where people set up toll stations where they collect money from road users. We have talked about this issue for some years, but we need to take action now. We should be action-oriented, so that we develop our country, instead of just coming up with policy papers and putting them on the shelves. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, finally, I want to say that the engineers at the district levels and even at the headquarters should encourage our own people, especially in the rural areas, to register as contractors. We should not have just a few contractors who will kind of form a cartel to fleece the public. In any case, we will be creating employment in those rural areas if we have some contractors. This is because they will create employment for themselves and employ a few others as they work on those roads. So, I think this is important, but it is not easy. I say this because I have tried to assist a few people to get registered as contractors, but bureaucracy thwarted my efforts. So, we want to ease this, so that we have contractors based in the districts and constituencies. There will be more competition. In the process, our people will get better returns. Otherwise, when we do not have contractors in the districts, you are told that since we cannot raise them locally, we have to pay a certain premium to attract contractors from far. So, I think it is important to do so. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, as I wind up my contribution, we want to hear from the Minister regarding the Roads 2000 Programme. This programme has been with us for very many years. It was said it would start in July or November, last year, but it has never started. We want to hear whether the European Union (EU) or the European Commission (EC) is committed to this project. Otherwise, the Government should take over those commitments and meet them since we have waited for these funds for so long. I hope the Minister is taking note of this because it involves a lot of money. Why talk of money that is not coming? Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, if the programme will ever take place, we also want practical terms that we, as country, can meet. We do not also want to see it taking so long before it starts. We also want terms that we can afford because this money is not for free. In one way or the other, we will repay it. I am sure we will be hearing from the Minister about this programme from the EU, or wherever other donors will come on board. We should hear what the Minister will do about employing more engineers and ensure that they are properly paid and trained. We should also hear about this last component, whether there is the road construction and maintenance in one contract. That should be observed, so that the contractor does not put the money that he is supposed to use for maintenance into his pocket. 1802 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES June 13, 2007 Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, let me finish by urging the Minister to talk to a company called Intex. Intex Company has done a road leading to Meru Town for the last three-and- a-half years. The same company has been given the C92 Road from Ena through Ishiara, Ciakariga to Meru Town. The starting does not look very encouraging. These days, I have decided to be driving along that road every week I go home. The work being done there, is not encouraging at all. There is a tractor being driven along that road just to show that the job is being done. When you go the following week, the same tractor is just moving slowly along that road. I hope the Minister will be able to follow up this company before it messes us up. That contractor has been there, but he is doing nothing. People in Meru think that their leaders do not talk about this company which has been there for three-and-a-half years."
}