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{
    "id": 666481,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/666481/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 218,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Musyimi",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 95,
        "legal_name": "Mutava Musyimi",
        "slug": "mutava-musyimi"
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    "content": "within the region wish to enter into serious understanding where they can bring their Members and staff for training once we establish this facility. It would be a regional centre servicing parliaments within the region. We have had lengthy discussions about this. Initially when the meeting started, we were told that we should look for land somewhere in the area towards Machakos or Kajiado where we were looking at about 40 or 50 acres. That was the recommendation. We have had lengthy discussions. We also had some slight misgivings as to how well thought through this matter was. I am happy to say today that we have had very lengthy consultations, pretty much all day with Members of PSC. I have also had the privilege and occasion to call you, as the Chair of PSC. We, as the Budget and Appropriations Committee, feel very highly persuaded that we need to invest in a piece of land. Among the three that had been looked at by PSC, so far, the one that seems to be most attractive is a piece of land in the area of Limuru, next to St. Paul’s University. Having had the privilege of being a General Secretary of the National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK) for 14 years, I am privy to how beautiful that place is. We had the Limuru Conference and Training Centre, the oldest training centre in the country and St. Paul’s University College where I served as Chairman for quite some time. I know we wanted to buy the prime land that we are now talking about. If this deal can be concluded in days to come, Parliament will remember this as one of your legacies and one of the legacies of the 11th Parliament. Among the pieces of land that had been looked at, this has caught our attention. The kind of numbers we are dealing with as we talk with the prospective seller is in the region of Kshs20 million to Kshs25 million per acre, which is very fair for that area. That is the price of land in that part of Kenya. One of the points that were made, which I think is very valid, is that we do not want to put the centre in the middle of nowhere. It needs to be next to other training institutions. It needs to be near a university, if possible. We have that along Limuru Road. When we worked the figures, we saw that 50 acres is what we should go for instead of buying 40 acres and then ask for 10 acres to be set aside for us to buy later. We know that once we buy these 40 acres, the price of land will go up and we shall be coming back to ask this Parliament to approve another 10 acres. When this kind of investment is happening, and I have done a bit of it myself in my life for institutions that I have had the privilege to work for, it always seems like a very big thing and almost overwhelming, but five to 10 years down the road you look back and wish you had done more. I want to persuade Members and thank PSC, under your leadership, for this remarkable vision of having a training centre for the Kenyan Parliament. I want to believe we will agree to support this idea. Big as it seems today, I want to assure Members that down the road, the same Members will say that this was a prophetic and bold move. It is a bit like passing an opportunity to buy land in Karen, say, five years ago only to go back and find it is costing almost five times what you would have paid had you had the vision at the time. We strongly recommend and support the PSC request to add Kshs150 million and add another Kshs950 million to come to Kshs1.1 billion, so that we can acquire 50 acres for the CPST that will be extremely useful to this Parliament and also to parliaments in the region. This is a vision of making Nairobi a hub for parliamentary studies and training. We recommend that very highly. It is a pity that Hon. Chris Wamalwa is not here to hear that the Chair of the Budget and Appropriations Committee has capacity to give some explanatory notes on matters that he wishes to present to the House. Finally, on my side, just two items not small matters by any means, but they are reductions as you will notice. One is a reduction to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) by a 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."
}