Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 983613,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/983613/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 200,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Murang’a CWR, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. (Ms.) Sabina Chege",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 884,
        "legal_name": "Sabina Wanjiru Chege",
        "slug": "sabina-wanjiru-chege"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker. I am going to be very brief. As much as I applaud the Senate on this Bill, you can judge a society by the way it takes care of its children and the elderly. We are a very unique community and society. If you look at our basic education, we say it is free. You will find that at the lower levels, the foundations, the most important aspect of our education, we do not provide it for free to our children, hence the spirit of the Bill to encourage county governments to take care of the elderly and have homes for elders. When you go back to our villages, our nursery schools are pathetic. As we debate and look at this Bill, let us ask ourselves the hard questions. Yes, we have laws, but who is going to implement them and how is the implementation going to be? I am always at pains when I go to the village and find abandoned old men and women. Children of some of them came to Nairobi or to other urban centres and do not remember them. You will find that some of them do not have shelter and food, but we have the church and the society which may be having surplus to eat and drink. They do not remember the elderly. We should support this Bill to establish structures. What are we doing with what the Government has provided? Yes, I want to support my colleagues who are saying that we need to have data, but we were all registered through the Huduma Namba. We also had the census. So, all these are statistics. If you want to know how many people in Kenya who are over 70 years old, it will be by a click of a button. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, the Government promised that we were going to provide free healthcare cover through the National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) to every person, whether a woman or man; rich or poor, at the age of 70. Sadly, this is not happening. We have some elderly persons with NHIF cards provided by the Government, but when they go to health facilities, they are told that the cards are not in use. We are paying the monthly subscription fees for the NHIF cover, but when the money delays getting to the NHIF, the cards become useless. So, even from the data that we have for the same people that we are covering, we should be able to care for their health."
}