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{
    "id": 737892,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/737892/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 145,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. S.S. Ahmed",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 140,
        "legal_name": "Ahmed Shakeel Shabbir Ahmed",
        "slug": "shakeel-shabbir"
    },
    "content": "agency will be fast-tracked and they will be given the teeth to act. They should be given prosecutorial powers and support by the Government. Coming back to the issue of subsidies, we are being told that we are subsidising the price of maize floor with the large millers who are purchasing some of the maize that has come from South Africa, when our farmers had extra maize. Instead of subsidising that maize so that they can recover their money, we were buying that maize at a throw-away rate of Kshs2,500. At that time, we were pleading with the Government to subsidise the maize of those farmers. They did not because there is a cartel. That is the situation now. As I speak, there is a meeting that is going on between the millers, who are split into two. There are the larger millers who supply less than 40 per cent of the market and there are the smaller millers who supply 60 per cent of the market. The so-called maize that has come has been distributed the wrong way. The larger millers, who have a 40 per cent market share, have been given 70 per cent of the maize that has come and the smaller millers, who have a 60 per cent market share, have been given less than 40 per cent of that maize. It is basically curtailing. They have given it to the larger millers because they want a kickback. It happened in 2010. It is happening now again. I hope that those cartels can be stopped. Those cartels are less than 10. They import the maize. There is one called Grain Bulk Handling. It offloads the maize. They are the importers, the distributors, the retailers and they mill the maize to floor and make bread with it and sell it in the retail market. We passed a Bill here on vertical integration. It did not happen. One of these guys came out clearly saying that he has imported so much maize. As it is, you will be shocked to know that within other two or three days from now – and I stand here to say that – there will be another ship bringing more maize because it is just outside our boundaries. What happens is when we have passed a Bill to subsidise something, the Government subsidises. But who is taking that subsidy? It is the corrupt officials who are going to take that money. The Jubilee Government must do something about it or else they will lose the elections. We hope that we will have a NASA government on 8th August 2017."
}