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{
"id": 664288,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/664288/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Hon. Kang’ata",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 1826,
"legal_name": "Irungu Kang'ata",
"slug": "irungu-kangata"
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"content": "I hold free medical camps day in, day out in Kiharu Constituency. At times, we buy spectacles at Kshs200 and give people for free. But when you ask the price of those spectacles at, for instance, a pharmacy or an optical shop, you will be told that it is Kshs7,000. That means that the price of drugs has not gone down, notwithstanding the exemption of taxes. Those benefits are not percolated to the mwananchi . By the way, it is even worse in a situation where you have a person who was being levied VAT and then you give him exemption. That person will not go announcing: “Hey, people, I have now received a tax relief.” He will not say that. Therefore, there is a likelihood that he will retain that price and the people will still continue paying the old price and yet, there has been an exemption. To me, the best approach is not to exempt but to zero-rate. Once you zero-rate, then the Government will, at least, have the mechanism of ensuring that the benefit is being accrued by the farmer or the processor. The Temporary Deputy Speaker, allow me to express myself on some of the sentiments that have been given here by my colleagues regarding the issue of protection of industries. We are now in a globalised economy. In a globalised economy, it does not make sense to protect an industry. We should never at any time protect an industry. We should build capacity. For instance, how much money do we appropriate every year to that sector? You will find it is about Kshs10 billion. If you were to use that Kshs10 billion to, for instance, build more roads in Kakamega or Vihiga, you are going to lower the cost of production of sugar as opposed to taking Kshs10 billion to Chemelil Sugar Company or Mumias Sugar Company, which ends up being misappropriated by those people. In this modern age, state ownership of parastatals is no longer rational. Even China was, the other day, being celebrated as a country that state owned enterprises are very good. We have several of them here in Kenya like Sheng Li and China Wu Yi, which make roads. However, if you look at the present China now, it is being told to scale down on state investments and state ownership of property. Therefore, in my assessment, under a globalised economy, governments should not channel money to any company. The free market economic forces should be allowed to reign. Therefore, I support this amendment. I have no problem with it but, instead of exempting, I propose we zero-rate so that we ensure that this benefit accrues to the farmer or, at least, to the processor. This is because, as I have illustrated, there are so many products here which have been exempted and the benefit is not accruing to the farmer. Therefore, in my assessment, that is the only way we are going to ensure that the sugarcane farmer is happy. With those few remarks, I support, but subject to the argument that it is better to zero-rate as opposed to exempting. Thank you."
}