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{
    "id": 56323,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/56323/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 291,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Kathuri",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 38,
        "legal_name": "Emilio Mureithi Kathuri",
        "slug": "emilio-kathuri"
    },
    "content": "Thank you Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, for giving me this opportunity to make my remarks. From the outset, I would like to say that I support the Report laid on the Table of this House by the Committee on Energy, Communications and Information. I am a member of the Committee Energy, Communication and Information. It is true that this issue has attracted a lot of attention from all angles. We had a chance of meeting with the stakeholders. One of the many surprising issues is that there appears to be senior personalities within the system who are working closely with the multi- nationals to try and frustrate the efforts of our good Minister when he is try to revamp NOCK so that it can give us good services. It is even more surprising, considering that many of us, hon. Members, have travelled far and wide and seen how countries like China address some of their strategic businesses. The governments have a big input and they control a lot of activities that take place in some of the strategic investments in the counties. NOCK is one of them. Without fuel for a few seconds, this country could be completely grounded. When we see 30 per cent of the fuel capacity being controlled by NOCK; that, to me, is not good enough. It should be big enough to make us worried. The multi-nationals are still controlling 70 per cent which is good enough to make them do business and survive comfortably. As my colleague has said, they operate as an oligopoly to an extent where it becomes pure monopoly. When that happens, the ordinary mwananchi is left at the whims of the multi-nationals. It becomes difficult to dictate prices and even if the Minister wanted to control them, he would not be able to do it. There are no two ways to do it other than to fund NOCK adequately so that it can take care of such shortcomings which are likely to arise as a result of multi-nationals teaming up together to frustrate his efforts. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, at one time, I had proposed that we should revert back to price controls. That is a scenario where the Minister can dictate the market prices. When we look at the prices, you will see that, definitely, Kenyans are being short changed. If you see what is happening at the Geothermal Development Company (GDC), you will expect the Minister to allocate them more funds. However, we are concerned that KenGen is still doing what GDC is supposed to do. I wish the Ministry could separate the two properly so that we do not see the duties of a Government parastatal being duplicated by another parastatal which has the same shareholding as if they are competing for the same market. It is very important for us to have clear roles of GDC and KenGen, so that we can maximize our opportunities when it comes to energy production. With those few remarks, I beg to support."
}