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{
    "id": 916797,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/916797/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 357,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. (Dr.) Musuruve",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13188,
        "legal_name": "Getrude Musuruve Inimah",
        "slug": "getrude-musuruve-inimah"
    },
    "content": "can end up to be. We all have hidden potential. We do not know how somebody will be in the next five or ten years from now. When these children are given an opportunity, they can become leaders and bring changes in this country. Some of the great leaders in this country came from poor backgrounds, but were given an opportunity to access education. What is happening in HELB should never have happened. HELB has sort of become a business. It is wrong that a bright student from a poor background has to go to the HELB offices to ask for loan, and when they are given that loan, it starts accruing interest immediately. How can you start accruing interest on a loan given to a student who has not even started first year? How can you start accruing interest on a loan given to a student who comes from a poor family and cannot meet the basic needs? Children from humble backgrounds do have challenges in colleges. The HELB money is never enough and those children have to do part-time work and undeserving things to make ends meet. This should not happen in a country that is concerned about children’s right and education. The HELB should not ask for interest from students when they are still in college. These students do not have a guarantee of getting a job after college. Some of them get jobs immediately after college, while others look for jobs for ten or 15 years. These are individuals who are already frustrated. They do not have a job or source of income, yet the HELB has already doubled the interest. The HELB should stop being cunning. We cannot take Kenyans for a ride. We cannot decide that university education loan shall be a shylock business. They should come here and tell us whether HELB has become a shylock, such that if you do not pay for a month you are told the interest is accruing. It will come a time when some students will give up and say: “I come from a poor family, do not have a job; my parents do not have land and I have to build a house for them; I cannot even be married.” Some children will take away their lives. We should not allow manmade deaths to happen. The HELB should hear this, and I hope the CEO of HELB is listening. We should not allow manmade stress and death to happen simply because we are being cunning. There is need for the Government to put mechanisms in place to ensure that children of this nation yearn to have free education. We should have free university education."
}