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{
    "id": 47445,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/47445/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 327,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Mututho",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 97,
        "legal_name": "John Michael Njenga Mututho",
        "slug": "john-mututho"
    },
    "content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, over-mature cane was recorded all through. There was also gross mismanagement of factories. More particularly, if you look at the case of Muhoroni, which I will deal with at length later on, you cannot understand how a receiver manager receives Kshs2.5 million per month, and yet the revenue from the investment is only Kshs4 million. So, you will find that the receiver manager receives over 50 per cent of the entire revenue. When you look again at the number of acres which are being farmed, then you will realize that something is awfully wrong in this particular industry. We will be dealing with that later on. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the fifth problem that we have noticed is the nuclear estate. In the case of Mumias, for instance, the amount of land that the farmers surrendered at Kshs90 per acre is immense. As you fumble around and we look around through privatization process, it is important to realize that this was people’s land. As we privatize, it is good to give some consideration. Again, we will deal with that one later on in my Report. More importantly, we need to ask the investors whether foreign or local to appreciate the value of land. People, particularly, in Mumias ought to be compensated properly because Kshs90 per acre, leaves a lot to be desired. Most importantly, when you are doing privatization, it is good to separate the two; the nuclear farms and also the factory. In any event, why do you want to do the production yourself and then you also want to come and do the milling, whole selling and retailing? At least there must be a break somewhere. So, if the factories and the millers could focus on their core business; that of working on their factories, then that will be good. They will then leave the land to the land owners. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, there is also low cane prices, heavy taxation and other deductions. No other crop is taxed up to 27 per cent. It defeats all practical purposes. When you take the submission of all the taxation, you wonder why you want to come and penalize this poor sugar farmer 27 per cent. You can give it all the names you want to give, levies or whatever you want, but the bottom-line is that you are taxing the farmer 27 per cent. Remember, I have already said that the factory manager also manipulates 20 per cent. So, at the start, the farmer has lost 47 per cent. How will they ever make money? Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, there were some very emotional moments and I would invite you also to peruse through the HANSARD Report. It is a heavy one; it is over 3,300 pages. You will see one farmer particularly from Mumias area who says candidly that from 1975, although he has 100 acres of land, no farmer has ever bought a new vehicle in that area of Mumias which covers 22 constituencies. In modern economics, of course, you cannot use a car as a measure of wealth. But it is good to show as an indicator that things are not okay. The farmer had appeared before the Committee and this is appearing in the HANSARD Report. He said he bought a grey three-piece suit in 1978. He still clad in it up until today. He has not been able to afford a new one. But he has a very good crop covering over 100 acres. At this moment, I want to remind you of a case in Kitui one time in a place called Mutito. There was a big bridge. The bridge was so big that the World Bank chiefs felt that it was not economically viable to use all the parameters. After a lot of studies and arguments, in the final meeting which was meant to reject it and put the final nail in the coffin, the engineer in charge from World Bank, all the way from Washington looked at one paragraph in the feasibility studies and saw that during the rains like now, families have to rely on arrows. There was no MPESA service. So, one has to tie money on an arrow then shoot across, so that the family can receive money which lasts them for about three months. At that point in time the IMF and the World Bank said there must be a problem. We may miss the language. We may not be able to express out rightly that there must be a problem. I am now saying there is a problem. If a man owns 100 acres of very good crop and was able to buy a three piece suit in 1978 and has not been able to buy another one and he is still clad in it and the smart old man is still there and that is his Sunday, Monday and Christmas best, there must be a problem. There must be some funny thing. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, some of the most famous sugar barons were Barclays and Relt. These are people who were slave traders initially. They eventually became rich and went on to own plantations in the West Indies and other places. They became so rich. One of them started a banking chains and the other one shipping lines. Sugar as an industry has a history of oppression. Looking at the hon. Minister and Ramisi Sugar Factory, no one would give any logical explanation as to why this Government allowed somebody known to be an investor of suspicious origin like we have said here --- You cannot say he is Indian or Kenyan. You cannot say who he is. He is allowed to come on in the name of an investor and take over 11,000 acres of land. What is even worse and disturbing is that he declares the original owners squatters. These issues are not good. The same thing is happening to Mumias Sugar Company. It is quoted in the stock exchange. This is a very good company. They got Tana River and decided immediately that those poor farmers who have been there for over 500 years are now squatters and they should be removed. This Government should use force to go and remove those squatters."
}