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{
    "id": 386215,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/386215/?format=api",
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    "content": "project has worked and will continue to work. It is in the same spirit that I believe we must take new challenges. It may not work as well as we would like it to work at the beginning, but the question is: Is it a good thing if it is properly managed? Can we grow it and see to it that maybe in the next five, ten or 20 years, it shall work? Yesterday, I was listening to my friend, Sen. (Dr.) Khalwale, giving his address. He talked about football and said that children in nations like Brazil and Argentina are exposed to football when they are as young as three years. That is what creates the culture of football in those countries. It is not that their young ones are any more brilliant than our young people who are here. We can play football and do great things, but we do not agree to take the challenges that are there to be taken. Mr. Speaker, Sir, if a child of three or six years starts with a laptop, then we are talking about a possible true digital age in the next eight to 20 years, when it will be a tool, like we use a pencil for those of us who are in the analog age and cannot freely use a computer. We must make a computer a tool that our children can use in the coming years. That is why I support the initiative to have a laptop for each child, because I do not believe in procrastination. I believe that it is imperative that we should start somewhere and then move on. Mr. Speaker, Sir, there is only one other issue that I would like to look at this morning, that is diplomacy. We are going to have a Committee on Defence and Foreign Relations. I would like to challenge that Committee when it is finally formed. I would like to remind that Committee that the sovereignty of this country remains of vital importance to us, as a nation. We do not want to see that Committee as one that hops between and among our foreign missions, harassing the officials of those missions, instead of working for the real reason. We have Ambassadors of foreign countries making disparaging statements about our country everyday; things they cannot do in some other foreign countries. I was an Ambassador and never stood up to speak against the country where I was assigned, because it is against the Vienna Convention. Why do we in Kenya allow foreign diplomats to go to public meetings and talk about our country without giving it the respect that it deserves? I want to challenge that Committee, when finally it comes into force, to make sure that they guard seriously the sovereignty of this nation and insist on mutual respect among nations. That is important if we have to develop as countries that respect each other. That is a challenge that I give seriously, noting that diplomacy these days is about economics. It is about how we can grow our economies and not about the years of the Cold War when some people thought that they had sovereignty over others. If we allow ourselves to be “over lorded” by other people then, again, it will be a very difficult thing for us to continue to develop as a nation. Mr. Speaker, Sir, there are many issues that we could discuss. We will continue to discuss them as time goes. Let me end by saying that this is our country. It is one nation and all of us must work towards protecting and defending it. That is why I wind up my few remarks this morning by reminding all of us again about the need to be bipartisan and not argue and quarrel even when there is no reason or point to make. We must be bipartisan, remembering that the nation is looking up to us, as Senators, to be the cement and the glue that keeps our nation together. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I beg to support. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}