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"id": 228921,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/228921/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Kiunjuri",
"speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister for Energy",
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"id": 175,
"legal_name": "Festus Mwangi Kiunjuri",
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"content": "goes through. How many years do they spend in courts seeking justice? We know our judges are over-worked. Some of us with cases in court are very happy. As long as they remain there for ten or 20 years, we shall continue making sure that the wheels of justice are not in motion. We can, therefore, spend our time in public rallies complaining that we are being persecuted if we are taken to court. However, we know the courts cannot move because of the few numbers of judges. Secondly, if you look at the economic implications of this, the people in court everyday results in this country losing a lot of resources. I guess that over 100,000 Kenyans are in courts everyday. Every morning, if you go to courts, the corridors are full of people. Those are resources wasted because those people could be doing other profitable work if they could get their cases heard and disposed of in good time. I support calls for addition of the number of judges. It does not matter how many we intend to have, but we should have more judges than we have today. We should also have a Court of Appeal in every province so that we do not have the panel of Judges of Court of Appeal moving all over the country to hear appeal cases and yet, their qualifications are just the same as those of the other judges of lower cadre. We even have other people who are not judges but can be appointed to do the same work. So, it is an issue that we should support and it should be addressed so that we do not have people complaining that their cases have been pending in courts for the last ten years. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, with regard to the economic growth, when you listen to arguments being advanced by some hon. Members, and you compare them with those of people who never went beyond Standard Two, you will not be able to know the difference. When an hon. Member in a public rally or in this House argues that the economic growth has not trickled down to the people, then you wonder how a person down there, who cannot understand what economic growth means, will interpret it. For example, we have free primary education today. That means that we are drawing from public coffers. Therefore, wananchi who used to pay Kshs100 per term are saving it directly because they no-longer pay it to schools. That means that wananchi have benefitted directly. If we say that today farmers are selling milk at Kshs18 up from Kshs7, it means March 28, 2007 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 185 that, that farmer who used to pour his milk because there was no market is now getting an extra Kshs11. That also means that a farmer who is now able to sell maize for Kshs1,400 per 90 Kilogramme bag of maize up from Kshs400, is now able to earn an extra Kshs1,000. That is what economic growth translates to. Therefore, as we play politics, we should also agree that important strides have been made. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, when people start arguing that the Government has only connected 20 fish landing sites with power, they forget that there had been none for the last 40 years. Those are the people who will complain that their breakfast did not include buttered bread and forget that they are now having full lunch and supper which they never used to get before. Therefore, let us be considerate. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we have people talking about tribalism and running all over saying that Public Service jobs have been taken by one community, yet they do not tell us what the population distribution in this country is and the distribution in each Ministry. They just pick on one Ministry and say that it consists of one tribe but they do not want to consider the other Ministries. When they talk about distribution of resources, they do not talk of tribalism at that juncture. They do not tell Kenyans that, that community has a population of 2 million people and yet it is getting an equal share of the resources just like the small communities. So, if you want to pick on one field, for attack, then you should bring all the facts on the table so that you can be understood. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, today, we look like hawkers. The work of a hawker is to hawk where the merchandise will get a market. If the market is in Mombasa, they will run there. The only issue that we can sell in our political platforms is the Kikuyu-bashing all through. Address any public rally in this country; you will not sell until you have bashed Kikuyus and said everything good or bad that you know about them. Most times, it is the bad things. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, with regard to the Constitution reforms, we have never been opposed to them. There is nothing that anybody in this country is advocating for---"
}