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{
    "id": 600386,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/600386/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 118,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Mulu",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1955,
        "legal_name": "Benson Makali Mulu",
        "slug": "benson-makali-mulu"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker for giving me the chance to also support this important Bill. This Bill is quite important to this country. Despite it being one of the Bills which are going to give effect to our new Constitution, it is also very important in terms of ensuring that our traditional knowledge and cultural expressions are not only protected but are also promoted. We have a number of communities in this country. I had a chance to interact with almost all these communities in my working life. One of the things I have realised is that this country is very rich in terms of customs and cultural practices. It is unfortunate that after almost 52 years of Independence, it is now that we are taking it seriously as a country to make sure that we protect this knowledge and cultural practices. Intellectuals in this country and in the world have made sure that their intellectual property rights have been protected through legislative frameworks or other frameworks which make sure that once you discover something as an intellectual, then that right is protected and you benefit out of it. This should have happened to our customs and traditions. It is unfortunate that it has not happened. I thank the framers of the new Constitution 2010 who thought that this is an important issue to be taken care of in this country. This country will go very far if we take advantage of the diversity of our traditions and use it as a unifying factor. These traditions also vary from one community to another. The history of these traditions made sure that communities remained united and disciplined and there was a kind of transfer mechanism from one generation to another. We lost that bit after we ignored this. There is a lot of division in some communities in this country because that unifying factor disappeared. I will give an example of the Kamba community to which I belong. This community has very rich traditions and cultural practices. These traditions and practices used to revolve around trees. We had a lot of traditional medicines from our trees. None of us would really complain about blood pressure or diabetes because the medicine from our trees helped us get through these problems. However, over time, we ignored that and now even kids who are less than 20 years old are suffering from high blood pressure and diabetes. You wonder where the diseases come from. The Kamba community is known for wood carving. If you go to any place in this world, you will not miss a wood carving made by Kamba artists. This has not been protected and you realise that even other people who are not experts in this particular area are also doing their carvings. This has really degraded what has been known for a long time to be a speciality of the Kamba community. We also had our own religion. People used to be very committed to that religion. At times when there was no rain, elders would go to holy places which had been identified, spend a day or 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."
}