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"speaker_name": "Mr. Karaba",
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"legal_name": "Daniel Dickson Karaba",
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"content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, for giving me this chance to contribute. I support the Minister for Finance for doing us proud by presenting his very wonderful Budget Speech. At the outset, quite a number of issues require some clarifications from the Minister. It is true he said that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) expenditure went up to 46 per cent. Salaries, particularly for teachers, have been increased. Teachers perform an important role of fostering national unity. Therefore, those allocations should be increased to employ additional teachers to cope up with the increased number of pupils as a result of free primary education. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, with the introduction of free primary education, the number of pupils has increased from 5.9 million to 7.2 million. The number of teachers has not increased as a result of that. The teachers are stressed. Most of them teach in congested classrooms. Teachers are forced to teach for extra hours because of large number of pupils. Recently, during the national conference for head teachers, there was a suggestion that teachers should teach 40 lessons per week. That is unimaginable and impossible. We need to think about quality education. The Ministry of Education and Ministry of Finance should come up with a workable formula, so that teachers and students can benefit from free primary education. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the increased number of pupils in primary schools will definitely translate to an increase in the number of students in secondary schools. We should have been told how much money will be used to construct classrooms, so that pupils who will sit for the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) in Class Eight, will have classrooms in Form I. This was missing in the Budget and as a result, most of us are using the CDF to construct classrooms. Recently, we heard about the outburst of the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Education, who was saying that we do not need to construct so many classrooms. There is an increase in the June 27, 2006 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 1611 number of students from primary schools to secondary schools, and yet there is an embargo by the Ministry of Education not to construct classrooms. That contradicts the spirit of the Free Primary Education Programme. This should be clarified. You will also note that a lot of emphasis has been put on the national defence and about 20 per cent of the Budget has been allocated to the Ministry of Defence. Given the fact that we have not had major wars from external aggressors, we need to be told how the 20 per cent allocation will be spent. Will the money be spent to feed the soldiers, to buy equipment or anything that is related to national defence. We also need to be told what the soldiers do in the barracks. We need to see more work being done like in South East Asia or Arab countries where army men undertake construction works. If this is done, we will minimise expenditure in the various Ministries and reduce cost on road, classroom and bridge construction. We will also eradicate some of the problems that we face in the country. This amount of money is too much to be spent on a Ministry that is not as expansive as the Ministry of Education. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I have also noted that in the Budget, no room was left to expand the Ministry of Education. Being the Chairman of the Committee on Education, Research and Technology, I am surprised to note that most of the students who sat for the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) and qualified to join our public universities will not be able to do so. This year, the Joint Admissions Board has fixed 69 points as the minimum entry point to our public universities. This is a B+ Grade and anybody who can attain this grade is a very intelligent student. If students with less than B+ will not be admitted to the university, they will be frustrated. The teachers and even the parents will also be frustrated. Most of these students will find their way outside Kenya and this is creating a time bomb for this country. The Minister for Finance should have allocated more money to the Ministry of Education, so that we can expand our universities and have C+ as the minimum requirement for the university entry. Students who cannot afford to join the Parallel Degree Programme or join universities overseas will languish in poverty and will create problems to many of us and hence the need to increase the number of our security officers. This is not necessary. The Minister should have allocated more money to the University Council, so that we can expand our universities and start new ones. The Government is fleecing the poor parents through the payment of fees under the Parallel Degree Programme. As a result, so many students are leaving the country and pursuing degree courses outside the country. Over 40,000 students have left Kenya for Uganda. This leads to a lot of capital flight and loss of manpower. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we also take without exception that the Minister did not say anything about bursaries. You will note that Kshs800 million was allocated for bursaries in the last year's Budget. This year's Budget was silent about bursaries. When we inquired further, we were told by the Minister that money will be disbursed to the constituencies directly. We are yet to be told how direct the disbursement will be done because it is not being done through the CDF or the Ministry of Education, and many people are asking what will happen to the money. This point should, therefore, be clarified, so that if the bursary money will not be available, we are told where it will have gone to. We want to know whether it will be factored into the CDF or into the promotion of personnel in the Ministry. We need to be clear on this, so that those who need bursaries can get them. The bursary awards should be increased, so that those who cannot afford to pay fees in secondary schools and universities are educated using the funds. I also note that the Ministry of Education seems to have been allocated a lot of money, which is not the case. This is an illusion. It is not true. The Ministry of Education is a service Ministry and it requires a lot of money to provide education to all the children in this country. I, would, therefore, ask the Ministry of Finance to collaborate with other Ministries, so that Ministries which 1612 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES June 27, 2006 have anything to do with education can share some expenditures with the Ministry of Education, so that the Budget of the Ministry of Education does not seem to be very hefty. For example, the Ministry of Roads and Public Works can do some works for the Ministry of Education. With those few remarks, I beg to support."
}