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{
"id": 282405,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/282405/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Samoei",
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"speaker": {
"id": 204,
"legal_name": "William Samoei Ruto",
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"content": "I am informed it is already listed, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. With that kind of product, what reason do we have, as a country, to receive only two million tourists when other destinations in the world – I will be specific; Paris, a city with just sculptures and old buildings receive 72 million tourists a year. London receives 30 million tourists a year. Last year I went to Malaysia, a country as good as Kenya; they receive 23 million tourists a year. It is a country of 25 million people. What reason do we have? From the statistics I have given, 72 million, 30 million, 23 million, why is Kenya receiving only two million tourists a year? We must get our act right. The Government must begin to tell the country what it is that we are not doing right. What is it that we have not got right in our strategy of expanding tourism to our country? Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, this is especially important because it is documented that for every one tourist who comes to Kenya, two Kenyans, or a maximum of three Kenyans, will get a job. With proper planning and ensuring that there is adequate security, making sure our road network is good enough, it is possible for us to increase our tourist arrivals from the one point something million tourist every year to five million within a year. With this, we can put up to five million Kenyans in a jobs. Even if we concentrated our energies on areas where we have comparative advantage like in tourism we would manage to turn around the economy of our country and we do not need rocket science. Apart from the mention of the Tourism and the Limited Liability Bill, I would have expected the President to expound the Government policy on what we, as a country, are doing to bring the areas where we have comparative advantage to the mainstream, so that we can tap into the potential that they have for economic development of our country and for generation of jobs for our young men and women. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the area of devolution, which the President did mention to an extent in his Speech, is today in controversy. This is because what the people of this country voted for in the new Constitution was a clear mechanism to mainstream the participation of millions of Kenyans, who to date have no access to Government resources, in decision making. They have no access to the decision making organs of this country. Through devolution, it was envisaged that we would bring more Kenyans in our rural areas into the table to make decisions and secondly, to mainstream their participation in the use of public resources. What we see, through the Commission on Revenue Allocation (CRA), is almost a reversal. That Nairobi will continue to get the lion’s share of resources meant for devolution, is, indeed, an insult of the original concept of devolution. We would have expected criteria that ensure that the marginalized areas of our country, the areas that for a long time have been on the periphery of development of our nation are mainstreamed. Resources should be allocated to those areas in a manner that will develop this country in an equitable manner. That is the only way we can eliminate the current perception amongst many Kenyans that there is a minority who are proud to be Kenyans, and there are a majority who are persevering to be Kenyans. We must move, as a leadership, towards ensuring that we tackle the challenges that face our nation head on. It cannot continue to be business as usual. We cannot continue to make mere statements. It is time we match what we say with what we do; we must confront the challenges facing our country head on with concrete and precise solutions to them. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the issue of security continues to be a great source of concern to many Kenyans. As late as last week, we had bombs being thrown at churches and Kenyans continuing to lose lives. We must go out of our way to get value for the money we put in our security agencies. As we are talking our budget has Kshs100 billion every year set aside for our security agencies. Are we surely getting value for that money? That is a question that Kenyans continue to ask. If we are not, why not? Where is this money going to? We have to begin to look critically at what we are going to do to ensure that there is transparency, clarity and accountability when it comes to expenditure of money that is meant for our security agencies; we should not continue to shroud security purchases in secrecy. We have to be very clear. How does buying a gun become an item of secrecy? A gun is a very basic thing. The policemen carry them on the streets. So, how does it become an issue— Why do you have to hide how much you pay for a gun? These are issues that we must get accountability on. This House must have access to security purchases, so that we get value for money and we improve our security. I beg to support."
}