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{
    "id": 492203,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/492203/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 139,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Tong’i",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2611,
        "legal_name": "Richard Nyagaka Tongi",
        "slug": "richard-nyagaka-tongi"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, for giving me this opportunity to contribute to this very important Motion, which impacts on all of us. From the outset, I appreciate the effort made by hon. David Ochieng to ensure that this Motion comes before this House so that we can contribute to it and, hopefully, some day, make it a Bill so that we can address the concerns of our people. I do not want to repeat what has been said by my colleagues. But I must mention that we need to learn from the best practices. One of the best practices, in my view, is found in the western countries. In those countries, their roads have special lanes spared for motorcycle riders. We can copy that practice and introduce it in Kenya. That is because it has worked well for those countries in terms of managing traffic and avoiding road carnage – which has been a manace in our country. If we can provide for boda boda and bicycle lanes on the road that we are doing currently, we will go a long way in addressing that concern. We all appreciate that the boda boda subsector is a source of employment for our youth. We also have had cases where the police have taken advantage of the challenges of the youth and harrassed them, which is very unfair. We need to condemn that harrassment in the strongest terms possible and ensure that it does not happen. The police must stop harassing the youth so that they can do their job more proffessionaly without fear. If there are documents that they need to possess in order to do their job without being harrassed, then we need to support them to get those documents. It is also important that we subsidise the cost of training motorcyle riders. The training has been out of reach for most of the youth because they cannot raise the training fees. Therefore, we need to spare some money from Uwezo Fund and Constituencies Development Fund for training of our youth. That way, we will mitigate against the concerns and the challenges they are going to have in terms of accidents, which have been causing a lot of injuries to our people. The insurance sector, which is very important, needs to be empowered or encouraged to insure motorcycles, the riders and passengers. One may have sold a family piece of land and bought a motocyle. If such motorcyle is not insured, in the event of an accident happening, he will lose it. If the motorcyle is insured, he will have a fall-back plan. They will be compensated and go back to business, as opposed to a scenario where they lose their motorcyles, suffer permanent injuries, lose passengers and when they recover, they have nothing to fall back to. Therefore, we need to encourage insurance companies to insure boda boda motorcycles. If possible, we should pass a law in this House to compel insurance companies to come up with a good and affordable policy that our youth can take advantage of and purchase. My colleagues have talked about the purchase price of motorcyles. It is important that we get out of our way to ensure affordable prices. We know the prices of motorcycles. I was in Bangladesh not long ago. I was shocked that the price of a motorcyle in that part of the world is actually one-tenth of the price at which we buy it in The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}