constituency public hearings, mandera east ... - ConstitutionNet

21We need certain funds to be set aside for this marginal areas, including Mandera East. We say for every budget, we say 10%be given to every province. We are talking about Kenyans budget of about 220 billion or even 300 billion. Then we injectabout 30 billion in this province, then we will be able to have the infrastructure we are talking about - the roads, the schools.Last year, I think we sent less than two three students to the university. It is a serious matter, because the infrastructure inschools is not there, the poverty level is so high. So if we inject those funds, here is just like a family. We say in a family whenyou have a girl and a boy that is your family, you should educate them in the same way – give them equal opportunity.So Kenya is just like a family. If you don’t develop North Eastern Province, and you develop other provinces; it is just like youare living with a girl or the boy. So you will have a Kenya, which is highly developed, and Kenya, which is less developed, thenwe will have a limping Kenya. When one country, one part of the country is limping, we will pull you back from the rest of thecountry. ________ (inaudible) for affimative action, we want to have that budgetary provisions, so that we are at par with therest of the country. So that we have a sense of belonging, we do not have the cries that we have.On the issue of resources, our major resource is from this province, from this district from this constituency. We have thelivestock industry. Kenya needs to diversify its economy. There are countries like Botswana, where we have livestock, andGovernments in those areas have done serious policies, to market their livestock, to diversfy their economy and they aresustaining. Like a country like Somalia, has sustained itself because of livestock industry. This is a sector where theGovernment does not have any policy, since independence, or it had a divided policy, and our mainstay of economy, and I’msure if we had a serious policy we would not have been beggars, we would have been contributing the country’s coffers. Wewould have been paying enough taxes. We would have been, not only people’s recipients, we would also been paying if therewas that policy.So that policy has not been there, that’s why you people feel that they are forgetting, and that is their resource, the Governmentmust have. Like if you take tea, coffee, and other agricultural produce, there is board that looks into the interest of that cashcrop or that area, of that food crop or that particular resource. There has been no livestock policy, and even when theGovernment put KMC, they put it far away, even where the livestock is. It is in Nairobi, and we must take all our livestock upto Nairobi. So that’s why even we are saying, a policy has not been there to develop our resources, so the Government musthave a serious policy and I would have insisted that they should create the Ministry of Pastoral affairs, and then they form alivestock board that can market, can develop the livestock industry, so that we can sell our only resource.We have talked about education and unemployment, the serious unemployment in this district and I think in Kenya at large.And even us, we have very few people who are even educated. Because of the poor level of education, because of seriousunemployment, it is the major crisis. So something must be done to help unemployment. And because of the poverty levels, thehuman development in this province is very low, and in this district and in this constituency, the human development isinterrelated with human poverty. And because of less human development in these areas, and even unemployment for those