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{
    "id": 41480,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/41480/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 216,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Affey",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 381,
        "legal_name": "Mohammed Abdi Affey",
        "slug": "mohammed-affey"
    },
    "content": "I want to challenge our vernacular radio stations. They must be radio stations that encourage national unity. In Rwanda, the genocide was caused by vernacular radio stations. In Kenya, towards the last general election, vernacular radio stations played a divisive role. They are the ones that were spreading hate messages against communities and constituencies. I want to plead that we must regulate these radio stations, so that the messages that go out are not hate messages about a community. If anything, they should be messages that unite our people. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, this issue of ethnicity is very rampant in our universities. It is very strange that universities which are supposed to be centres of excellence; to train Kenyans to feel patriotic, are the same ones that encourage ethnicity. There are certain universities in Kenya where the entire management from the Vice- Chancellor all the way to the lecturers comes from the region where the Vice-Chancellor comes from. Therefore, unless we make a deliberate move to mix the leadership of our universities, so that these universities truly become national institutions and not community institutions, there is no way that this cancer of ethnicity will end. We use our vernacular as though if I use my mother tongue, I become more Kenyan that the other one who has not used his. We cannot reverse this unless we begin from the institutions of higher learning. I want to thank my colleague, hon. Mbau, for thinking about this and even going ahead to exempt the field officers who are training communities from the Motion. That is important because we must realize that this country is divided into 47 counties and there are certain counties where Kiswahili and English are still alien and foreign. Therefore, we must appreciate that these communities require to be educated and given information and the only way in which they can be given information is through the language and the medium that they understand. We want those officers who are communicating to do so with a level of patriotism and truthfulness, so that they do not end up misleading the communities they are supposed to educate. This Motion is ripe and I truly support it. With those remarks, I beg to support."
}