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{
    "id": 99141,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/99141/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 394,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Dr. Mwiria",
    "speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister for Higher Education, Science and Technology",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 190,
        "legal_name": "Valerian Kilemi Mwiria",
        "slug": "kilemi-mwiria"
    },
    "content": "you find in the Government, people are compromised. It is similar to some schools, where teachers and some board members are compromised. This is also a problem that we need to address; it can best be addressed by students themselves by ensuring that they elect students who are beyond reproach and are not ready to be compromised. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, in terms of improved communication, I think I have seen much more of that. Universities now have newsletters, bill boards and memoranda. There is an effort. We can do more. In terms of decentralizing governance, this is critically important. There are cases where some Vice-Chancellors may be high handed, and appoint certain people to key positions. I think this is still an area where we need to improve. We should be open enough to go to universities and tell them that there are certain incidents where Vice-Chancellors and deputy Vice-Chancellors are high handed. As we do that, we should ask staff associations like Universities Academic Staff Union (UASU), the student unions and academic staff members, including professors, why they let a few individuals be the ones to make certain decisions on their behalf. The problem is that academic staff members allow some things to happen. If they rose up and said: “We will be part of this decision. We cannot allow this,” it would not be that easy for the key administrators to influence what happens. So, generally, I agree that we should do much more to improve democratization. There are universities in this country that are worse than we were in 1992 when we were fighting for democratic space. There are universities in this country where managements are more autocratic than political systems and governance. We need to play a role, but much more with regard to those that are directly affected by what happens in those universities. The academic staff members and students should be the ones to first rise to the occasion. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, tribalism is a big problem. I do not agree with one hon. Member who said that Kenyatta University is the worst in terms of tribalism. I do not agree absolutely and that is why I made the point yesterday that we cannot say tribalism is much worse at Kenyatta University or Nairobi unless we are able to look at the situation across all the universities and are looking at the same factors. These factors are related to recruitment, promotion, student leadership and so on. I am not defending Kenyatta University because I am not the one running it. We are soon doing an audit of all institutions to establish the problem. I would just like to say that if you go to some of these universities in this country you will be surprised at the level of tribalism, where all the key people are from one ethnic group. Points were made about how we name universities. Do we have to name a university Moi University because it is built in that region where Moi came from or Kenyatta because it is where Jomo Kenyatta came from? Do we have to locate university only in those areas which have produced presidents in this country? Do we have to do that? Otherwise, it will be very difficult for some parts of this country to have university institutions. There are more serious cases. Yesterday we were looking for a Principal for Kisii University College. The moment a non-Kisii was proposed on the basis of merit, Kisiis, including politicians said, it would happen over their dead bodies. When someone else was proposed for Narok University on the basis of competence, they said, they must have a Maasai. It is politicians themselves who are talking about tribalism. This is a very"
}