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{
    "id": 95143,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/95143/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 216,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. M’Mithiaru",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 72,
        "legal_name": "Ntoitha M'mithiaru",
        "slug": "ntoitha-mmithiaru"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. I also stand to support this Motion. The students who sit the secondary level examinations every year are over 300,000. Those who get the qualifying mark of C+ (plus) are over 100,000. Our public universities today cannot accommodate that number. That is why the parallel degree programme came into. We laud the Government for having introduced the parallel degree programme. It was to support and ensure that each and every Kenyan child got university education. However, over time, because of the cost involved in taking a child for the parallel degree programme, it is only those who are wealthy who can educate their children through this programme. For those parents who cannot afford the fees, they will not take their children to the university. These children end up doing manual jobs, even the ones with grades B and B- (minus). This means that the children from poor backgrounds will continue to become poorer and poorer and that will then degenerate to a vicious cycle of that strata of our population. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, some parents have even gone to the extent of taking their children, for example, to Uganda, where university education is cheaper. Some even take their children to India because it is cheaper to do so. Why can we not have a programme within our Government to ensure that the cost of the parallel degree programme is affordable? Already, we can see that the Government is even losing money through the foreign exchange that students are paying for university education out there. It is only through a deliberate Government programme that we can have the parallel degree programme becoming affordable to everybody. This will not only save the Government some money, but will also ensure that the right of every Kenyan child to access higher education is guaranteed. Somebody talked about how the parallel degree programme is derogatory in itself. Students in the parallel degree programmes are taught by the same university lecturers. The course is parallel in that they cannot fit in the same class because the facilities are not enough. I would urge the Government to ensure that we have enough facilities in the university, so that they can increase the intake. The Government should increase the Budget for university education, so that university authorities can expand their facilities and admit more regular students. This would also ensure that the cost of the parallel degree programme is reduced, so that each and every Kenyan child can get university education. The fact that you do not have any money should not deter your children from getting the required university education."
}