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{
    "id": 373481,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/373481/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 384,
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    "speaker_name": "",
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    "content": "Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, I earlier said in this House that the common characteristic between a rich and a poor pastoralist is the degree of availability. Why do I say this? You wake up as a rich pastoralist with a large number of livestock, but simply because of flooding, drought, or conflict, the next day you wake up a pauper. Naturally, Tana River is a disaster prone area. We have been hitting the headlines for a wrong reason. We have been in the headlines because of flooding, drought and conflicts. A recurrence of these things has weakened, destroyed and dented our image as a community. Just for purposes of the background, it is TARDA and KenGen who run and manage dams. They release the waters from their dams into River Tana. The communities downstream have been at pains because of this action. Their role as public institutions is to announce via radio that they have released the water and so people should take care. These institutions release water into River Tana thereby destroying lives and livelihoods. They must be held responsible. They must come up with mechanisms to address the suffering of the people who live downstream. This artificial flooding has destroyed our lives and livelihoods. The fishermen, the pastoralists and the small scale farmers are displaced and disorganized annually. It is hypocritical of the Executive to come up with the Vision 2030 on one hand with policies claiming to build abbatoirs, markets and infrastructure in the ASAL areas and yet on the other hand releasing water from their dams sweeping away the few existing infrastructure and destroying lives and livelihoods. As representatives of the people, we need to come up with appropriate policies and mechanisms. We cannot destroy lives and livelihoods simply to make profits. Yes, we know how useful KenGen is, but it should not operate at the cost of the lives of Kenyans. I decided to come up with this Motion so that we can control flooding. We need appropriate polices and mechanisms in place to compensate people affected by artificial flooding caused by TARDA and KenGen. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, in conclusion, I request all the Members to support this Motion. May I, therefore, call upon hon. Abass Mohamed to second this Motion."
}