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"content": "Mr. Speaker, Sir, you know that a county like Turkana – which is almost the third or fourth-largest county in Kenya – has had only one secondary school for boys called Lodwar Boys Secondary School for a mighty long time. The girls’ schools are not even there, similarly in West Pokot. Therefore, the pool of educated people in some of the counties is quite low in this country, and this came in because we did not put things right at the beginning when we were putting premium in education through national schools. You recall that up in the entire north rift, it is only Moi Girls, Eldoret, that has existed for a long time, and getting a girl, for example, from West Pokot to that place is like, they say, forcing a camel through the eye of a needle because the same exam that a class eight pupil in West Pokot does to acquire those top marks required to go those top schools is quite high. So, I rise to support this Motion to say; let us use, as the Government, the same agenda of devolution that has come to remember that schools of quality must be done. I have a suggestion; two years ago, the current President introduced the Economic Stimulus Program when he was the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance, and every constituency was able to tap into it to build a quality school. If, in the same model, the Government approaches education in the same manner, we could correct this impression where we are saying we now have new national schools in every county. We have some that were just acquired one or two years ago but the communities have not accepted that there are top schools which they have built themselves. Where I come from, parents have sold their cows and goats to get their children admitted to the Government schools; what we call national schools. I would prefer that, in order to stabilize and equalize, funds are obtained and set aside by the Ministry of Education to pick national schools from grass to grace. We will give you land in the “bush,” rather than going to inherit existing schools that people have already known. I have an example of Tartar Girls Secondary School in West Pokot which now has five kids from West Pokot County out of the 180 girls there. Initially, Tartar used to take a significant number of girls from the area. So, I would say that we need to see how such a fund can be set aside and good schools are built. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I also want to second the fact that we also need universities in every county so that we can interlink and work together. Some counties have niche products that need to be paid attention to. As we produce manpower all the way from national schools to technical colleges and universities, some counties have to specialize in some courses. For example, we have just discovered oil. Which county would be best placed to build a college that is going to specialize in petroleum and oil studies other than where this thing has been found – Turkana or the neighboring counties? So, I would ask that the new Government considers to liberalize education and we build universities across the counties as well as also looking at the colleges. For example, in 1976, in West Pokot, the first nursing school was built and it stalled in 1978 up to date. The first four classes and a dormitory were built and nobody has occupied them to date. That is a significant almost 40 years ago, yet we require nurses and trained health personnel to deal with our problems, the diseases which are quite common in some of these areas. I would urge that as we consider expanding education in every county, West Pokot Kapenguria Nursing School should be restarted so that some of these common diseases can be handled. You notice that some of the areas they call ‘marginalized’--- and you post a 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."
}