Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 493716,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/493716/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 80,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Lati",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2762,
        "legal_name": "Jonathan Lelelit Lati",
        "slug": "jonathan-lelelit-lati"
    },
    "content": "So, I find this thing a little bit off the track. But there is something that can be said about men in the age of 35 to 50. We need to be a saving country with a saving culture. We are told that today for every Kshs100 that Kenyans get, 93 per cent is consumed. So, we leave about Kshs7 as disposable income or for saving. If we look at countries that have developed like Japan, their saving culture is at around 70 per cent. That is what we need to instill in the men aged 35 and 50 years; for God’s sake, they are not vulnerable. They need to save money and stop being consumers. Go to every bar in town on Friday and you will see what happens; let them stop that kind of thing so that they can have some money for development. We do not need a helping hand here. We need to encourage our men within that age bracket to save money and think of developing ourselves and our country will develop. Hon. Deputy Speaker, that said, there is also reason why we have things like banks and all other financial institutions in our country. They are meant for those people. At the age of 35, you are mature enough to walk into a bank, get a loan, pay it back and do whatever you want to do with it, and that way you will allow the Government to help the youth and women. One thing that we did as a country at Independence, which was special – we need to give thanks to the people who started our country, our forefathers – was that we took the capitalist way. This was unlike our neighbours, Tanzania, who tried to follow the socialist way. We cannot be socialists trying to help every Kenyan. Kenyans must work and we must create incentives for people to work. Any time you socialize everything in this country, you create a disincentive for people who will want to stay at home and wait for money or funds from wherever. That said, I think if we move in this direction, there will be a danger in that we will not be utilizing the funds that are already there. We already have a head start. I participate in Uwezo Fund meetings in my place and we already have some difficulty in that Fund because of the kind of regulations that are very difficult to be met by people, particularly people in the rural areas like where I come from. We should focus our attention on developing the existing funds like the Youth Enterprise Development Fund and Uwezo Fund. We should not ignore the existing funds, or lose track and leave these funds under-utilized. We need to have them going on. However, in principle, I think there are good reasons and intentions for any country to have funds and microfinance for small and medium enterprises to help people grow in business; but it does not necessarily have to be in the form of funds. It can easily be in the form of capacity building. We will try to help men if that is what they will need in capacity building to enable them borrow money from banks and to do business. With those remarks, I oppose. 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."
}