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"id": 394758,
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"speaker_name": "Sen. Wamatangi",
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"legal_name": "Paul Kimani Wamatangi",
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"content": "emergency vehicles becomes a reality. It will not be difficult to just construct this lane and then you find the same thing happening now is what is going to happen next time. Madam Temporary Speaker, the next group of our people that we need to educate to make this a useful reality is the ambulance drivers themselves. This is because when an ambulance driver takes on the road, even after the road has been cleared for them, many a times they will insist on using the lanes that are not fast. If they know that they are supposed to keep to the left and use the lanes that are fastest, then this would be a reality. Madam Temporary Speaker, the other group that needs to be discouraged as we debate this Motion is the one that I would want to call “ambulance chasers.” If you have noticed at any one time when an ambulance is going through traffic and courteous drivers would give way for an ambulance, there is a certain group or lot of drivers who think that this is their best opportunity to make their way home faster, and they will chase that ambulance. As you give way, somebody drops in line, and another one and another one. Within a short time, you have a beeline of vehicles chasing that ambulance, even sometimes to the extent of causing accidents. These Kenyans must be told that when we give way for ambulances to pass, we do not mean that they should be followed by this other traffic as though the other drivers do not intend to get home. Madam Temporary Speaker, it would be self-defeating if we debated this Motion without also bringing to the attention of our emergency services themselves that they need to look at the quality of their ambulances, fire-fighting equipment and all other emergency vehicles that they put on the road. Recently, I was on one of the roads in Nairobi and a vehicle was making a very strange noise behind me. I looked at my rear mirror to see what was happening, because even the noise it was making cannot pass for a siren. Just when I looked behind, I realized it was an emergency vehicle because, yes, it has the Red Cross logo and the writings of an ambulance, but the vehicle itself was a wreck; it cannot even get somebody to hospital in time! So, unless we also highlight to these people who also provide these services that, yes, as a Senate, we are fighting and we will ensure that they have their right of way in order to get our people where they need to get or to get your services to them, then your vehicles must also be serviceable. Madam Temporary Speaker, my colleague here, the Nominated Senator from Samburu, Sen. Lesuuda, also mentioned a very important point about the attitude of our people. If our people do not change their attitudes on the road, this will be a self- defeating cause. Because if there is one thing that is dragging us behind, especially as far as road manners are concerned, it is our attitude. Lastly, Madam Temporary Speaker, as I support this Motion--- Thank you, Madam Temporary Speaker; I think I have exhausted my points. I beg to support this Motion and congratulate my friend, Sen. Karaba."
}