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"id": 240974,
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"speaker_name": "Mr. M'Mukindia",
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"speaker": {
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"legal_name": "Kirugi Joseph Laiboni M'Mukindia",
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"content": "Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, for giving me this opportunity. I realise that there is little time left. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, from the outset, let me also congratulate the Minister and his staff for work very well done. I do not think any hon. Member of this House has any problem with the Minister who we are aware, has done a good job outside this country. I had opportunity to speak with him, having had the privilege of heading this Ministry many years ago, and shared some ideas with him as to what I think ought to be done or should be done. As Mr. Wambora said, we need to have a look at the region as a centre of our interest. The Minister is doing very well in that respect. However, there is an area that still remains unattended to. That is why I wish to join Mr. Mwiraria in urging Dr. Kituyi and his team to re-look at the area of industrialisation. Ten years ago, we developed a policy paper in which we aimed at achieving industrialisation status by the year 2020. I know that some people were not happy with that plan. I wonder why, four years down the line, since this Government came to power, nothing of the sort has come to Parliament for debate. We cannot get rid of poverty in this country unless we industrialise. That is, really, the bottom line. I hope that the Minister will do something before the end of next year so that we can, at least, leave some legacy of the Ninth Parliament as far as industrialisation is concerned. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, another issue I would like to very quickly comment on, is the kind of development model that we have. If you look at the history of Kenya in the past 20 years, say from 1985 to 1986, you will recall that we have gone through the so-called \"Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPS)\"; some \"medicine\" given to us by the IMF and the World Bank, which, of course, more or less killed the \"patient\" rather than cured the disease. After the SAPS failed to work, new ideas came in. There were programmes like IRAFS. Now there is the Poverty Eradication Programme and the Millennium Development Goals. For the last 20 years, this country has been moved from one prescription to another by the IMF and the World Bank, and none of these has worked. Kenyans have become poorer and poorer 2404 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES July 26, 2006 by the day. On the other hand, let us look at what China has done in the last 20 years. That country had its own development and industrialisation models. If we had adopted the same policies that China adopted in 1986, chances are that, today, our economy would be closer to China's. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, for 20 years, what have we done? We just keep listening to the IMF and the World Bank institutions which give us one prescription after another, and yet we are still where we were in 1986. Therefore, I would like to encourage the Minister and the Government as a whole, that time has come for us to have our own development model. The model that seems to work is the one that China, South Korea, Taiwan, Malaysia and Singapore adopted. These countries did not follow IMF or World Bank prescriptions. India never followed IMF and World Bank prescriptions. Why do we insist on accepting such prescriptions by the West, when we know that it is not in their interest for Kenya to develop? We know for sure that it is not in the interest of the West that Africa develops. Obviously, once we develop, we will be a challenge to them, whereas they do not want any challenges. They would rather that we remain weak, so that they can control us for as long as possible. With those few remarks, I beg to support."
}