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{
    "id": 839621,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/839621/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 311,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "What is happening in those youth polytechnics? There was a time where nobody wanted to hear that you are working in the Jua Kali sector. These days, when you ask civil servants who have retired where they are working, they will tell you that they are working in the Jua Kali sector. We had to sanitise Jua Kali to be what it is today. One of the things we did is to bring an exhibition to Nairobi and a proto type one here, in Eldoret. That has spurred off some of these young Kenyans to acquire skills. So, the purpose of youth polytechnics is to acquire skills, competence and also be properly trained in the methods of production. After they had gone through youth polytechnics, we also discovered that one of the tools that they needed was entrepreneurial skills. This is the nursery for future micro and medium level enterprises in our country. In any developing country and particularly, in the fast developing countries, one of the most important elements is to have the middle cadre level who are professionally competent in various aspects of industry. When you talk about plumbing, what kind of plumping? There is what we call amateur plumbing, professional plumbing and high pressure plumbing. They need to be trained along these lines so that they can handle various tasks. We have the Kenya Pipeline Company with a line from Mombasa which is putting through, the through-put of diesel or the imported fuel and even the refined fuel through the huge pipe in one of the centers, here in Eldoret. I remember when we had a burst of one of these lines, we had to get experts from France and yet, we have our own institutional mechanism where we can train these people to the highest level in that profession. If it is electronics, today, one of the things I was so happy about when we visited the Rift Valley Technical College, was when they showed us the Robotics Laboratory where they are using new science to demonstrate what the robots can be able to do. I want to tell you as a professional, that the reward today in complicated surgery, particularly in the spinal cord surgery or internal organ surgery, where the space operation is very minimal and very inadequate, so that the hand cannot be able to reach there, we are using robotic surgery to direct - commands being given by a specialist – in order to reach the organ you want to reach and be able to either excise it and cauterize it, so that you are able to secure a safe place and safe surgery through what we call non- invasive surgery. This is the in-thing today, and Kenyans must in-built with those top notch skills in order to handle the issues in this country. Therefore, vocational training, technical training institutes, the national polytechnics--- We turned the former Kenya Polytechnic and Mombasa Polytechnic into universities. What were we doing? We wanted to ensure that those who have the talent in youth polytechnics during the horizontal movement from KCPE to youth polytechnics, can move towards the world of work and earn their living, because they would have been empowered with entrepreneurial skills and been given resources to establish themselves into micro and medium scale enterprises. Those who have a pre-direction towards higher education can also move vertically towards the technical training institutes which are middle level training centres. That is the one we witnessed here today. The time when I was in that Ministry, they were eight of them, but since then, we have had quite a number of them in most of the counties and they are many. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}