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"id": 286472,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/286472/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Gaichuhie",
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"speaker": {
"id": 17,
"legal_name": "Nelson Ributhi Gaichuhie",
"slug": "nelson-gaichuhie"
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"content": "Thank you very much, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, for giving me this opportunity to contribute. First, I want to applaud the President for the Address he gave on 24th from the Floor of the House. Coming from an area where we have many IDPs, I want to thank him for the kind of money that he has put in the Budget so that we can be able to resettle the IDPs and the forest evictees. Rift Valley being the centre of forest evictees and IDPs, I want to thank him because he has given a lot of money for us to buy a lot of land for construction of houses and providing food for those who are not settled. I also want to ask the Government to consider the integrated IDPs who are very many. They need support, they should be integrated and resettled so that we no longer have the problem of IDPs in our country. I also want to thank the President for assuring us that we will have a very free and fair election in this dispensation of the new Constitution, and also for him having said that he will have a very smooth transition when he exits State House. On the matter of counties, it is good that we start operationalizing counties by providing staff and essential services that will be in place by August as per his promise because counties will provide critical and essential services like health, water, agriculture and even local transport within the counties. So, I think we should support the operationalization of the counties before August so that we can have them in place before we go into the next general elections. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, many Bills have been passed in this House and we are happy but we urge the Minister for Justice, National Cohesion and Constitutional Affairs, hon. Wamalwa, to speed up all the pending Bills so that the Constitution can be operational before we go into the next general election. On regional integration, I think the East African Community is doing well. We need to have regional integration because we need each other as a region. So far we are focused on the same direction and it is good that we really support even the forthcoming elections so that we can have representatives from all the countries. On economic growth, it is fortunate that we had gone up to 7 per cent but unfortunately we are now at 5.5 per cent. Despite the global recession, we are still agreeable that 5 per cent is achievable if all machineries of the Government work and I hope they will work. I also want to applaud the President and the Government because of the free primary education that we are giving our children. The number of school children has increased, and we are happy because once our children are educated we know we can achieve all our development agenda because education is the key. We also want to thank the President because of having passion for tarmarking of roads. Two thousand, seven hundred kilometres within a period of five years and even rehabilitation of the major roads is quite applaudable. We hope that his legacy will continue when we have the next Government because transport is very important for our country to develop. We have seen ICT developing and all that is development that should be continued by the next Government. We also want to thank the Constituencies Development Fund (CDF) because of the very many projects that the country has been able to achieve through it. We have been able to build schools, markets and all those things that are now in the constituencies. It has really devolved. I hope that even when we have the counties, they will use the CDF formula so that we can develop all our counties simultaneously because although we have 47 counties, Kenya is still one state that should be treated as a unitary state. On food security, I want to say that it is high time that we concentrated on irrigation because as we know rain-fed agriculture is no longer tenable. We should concentrate on irrigation. We should construct more dams, water pans and drill boreholes. Wherever we have land that we can put up dams, water pans or even drill boreholes, irrigation should be the way to go. I also want to thank the Government because of the issue of subsidized fertilizer and certified seeds. Though the Government has not really taken heed, we should have free fertilizer and certified seeds if we need to improve on food security. I thank the Government because of reviving the KCC although many farmers are still unpaid. This is the case although the management says they will pay before 15th. I hope they will continue paying all farmers before the 15th of every month and not only when we have milk crisis. The Kenya Meat Commission (KMC) is doing well although it needs to be rehabilitated and decentralized. We should not only have KMC in Nairobi but we should have it in all areas where we have cattle. In addition, we should also have value addition industries so that we can create more jobs. I also want to thank the Government because of creating the Youth Enterprise Development Fund and the Women Enterprise Development Fund. Although there are very many hurdles, I wish the two funds could be streamlined so that all our youth and women can access those funds without going through very many hurdles. I thank the Government because when we were economically down, they were able to come up with Economic Stimulus Programmes although it was not very successful in areas like markets. The local authorities should take up the markets that were left halfway so that we can have our products sold. This should also apply to the industrial parks that are already put up. We should have the machines in the industrial parks. The health centres which were built under the ESP should be equipped and be operational. I want to thank the Government because of opening up the northern part of Kenya. Fortunately, we are now happy because we have discovered oil. If the northern corridor is opened and infrastructure put in place, we know our oil will help open up the region. We want to thank the Government because of rehabilitating our airports, namely the Kisumu International Airport, the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and Moi International Airport in Mombasa. They should also increase the number of airports. I also hope that we will have an airport in Nakuru which has a high agricultural potential and receives many tourists so that it can open up the region of Nakuru. Finally, I want to thank the President for assuring us that he will transit State House comfortably, peacefully and that we shall have free and fair elections. With those very few remarks, I want to thank you and support this Motion."
}