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{
    "id": 935189,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/935189/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 209,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Gatundu North, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. (Ms.) Wanjiku Kibeh",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13339,
        "legal_name": "Annie Wanjiku Kibeh",
        "slug": "annie-wanjiku-kibeh"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker for the opportunity to also add my voice to this very important and critical Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (Amendment) Bill, 2019. Disaster risk reduction is not a new concept in this country and our education sector. I would like to remind the House that in 2003, the Ministry of Education came up with a Safety Standards Manual for schools in Kenya which was very clear as to what needs to be done in our schools to ensure the safety of our children. There is no way we can talk about provision of quality education in our country when our schools are not safe. I would like to just highlight a few issues that have been taken care of by this manual. The guidelines of the manual created the school safety committees that include the management of the schools. There are certain guidelines that have been given. If a school has no wall or fence, there is need to have an indication or a signage that there should be no trespass in it. The guidelines also stated that the school fields or playing grounds should be safe for our children in terms of where they are located and how level they are because that would also pose a danger to our children. Even as we look at the Bill and the amendment that tries to bring in the issue of safety in our curriculum, we need to be a little bit firm on schools’ management and the Ministry of Education to ensure that they enforce the set guidelines in the manual that has already taken care of some of this. Coming back to the Bill and in support of this very great initiative, it is very important to ensure that we also create linkages. I do not think we will create safe havens for our children in schools if we do not have linkages with the society and community. It is very important because parents need to be part of this. Service providers such as those who provide firefighting services need to be part of this. As we try to introduce this into the curriculum, we can use various approaches. We could either infuse or integrate the various subjects of safety into the curriculum or even create stand-alones. I want to emphasise the need to involve the community in all this. We have what we call the community policy. When we have a situation whereby our pupils face danger either in school or outside school, we need the community to be part of this. I also appreciated the fact that we now have the Competency Based Curriculum (CBC). This is a very good opportunity to ensure that that we entrench the issue of DRR in the curriculum in all our schools. I remember a situation at Lang’ata Road Primary School where children were demonstrating because their school land had been taken away. The reason why the Safety Manual stipulated how and why disputes in terms of ownership of land in a school will be handled is to avert such kind of situations. When you ask children to go out and demonstrate, you are putting them at risk. Therefore, I appeal to the Members in this House because our core duty as MPs - with the funds we receive under the NG-CDF - is to create safe institutions or learning environments for our children. Let us go back to our schools, look at them and see how safe they are to promote a good learning environment for our children. I support this Bill in recognition that as a country, we are a signatory to various international conventions that commit to ensuring quality and safe environments of learning for our children."
}