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Motion on youth affairs in Nyandarua County by Hon. Rebecca Nyangati Weru
WEDNESDAY 23RD JULY, 2014
REPUBLIC OF KENYA
NYANDARUA COUNTYASSEMBLY
1st ASSEMBLY-2nd SESSION
OFFICIAL HANSARD REPORT
The Hon. Speaker on the chair
2.30 pm
Prayers
Speaker: First order
Clerk:Administration of oath. Mr. Speaker, we don’t have administration of oath.
Speaker: Next.
Clerk: Communication from the chair.
Speaker: Honorable members I wish to communicate the receipt of a bill for introduction to the County Assembly of Nyandarua. It was received by the office of the speaker yesterday Tuesday the 23rd day of July, 2014. That is the Nyandarua County Trade Fund Bill, 2014. The same will be allocated time for tabling in this assembly and for its first reading by the House Business Committee.Next.
Clerk: Messages, Mr. Speaker we do not have any messages.
Speaker: Next.
Clerk: Petitions, We do not have any petitions.
Speaker: Next.
Clerk: Papers, Report on benchmarking by the committee on Delegated County Legislations by Hon. Peter Kamoche.
Speaker: Yes chairman committee on Delegated County Legislations.
Hon. Kamoche: Thank you Mr. Speaker sir, I beg to table the report of the committee on Delegated County Legislations on benchmarking done in Nyeri and Meru County. I now table the report with the clerk.
Speaker: The report, Honorable members is duly tabled and received by this House. I will leave it to the House Business committee, chairman committee on Delegated County Legislations, to allocate you time in the course of next week.
Clerk: Notices of motion. Mr. Speaker Sir, we have two notices of motion one by Hon. Kimani Njiraini.
Speaker: Member for Kaimbaga, Hon. Kimani Njiraini.
Hon. Njiraini: Thank you Mr. Speaker sir, we are happy to see you back to Kenya. I beg to give notice of the following motion.
Aware of the emergent dispute involving the proprietorship of the land Reference Nyandarua/ Ol’kalou Salient 117 and 118 (Gichugo Trading Centre) previously reserved as a trading centre, further aware that the plots have been licensed to the members of the public of the Gichugo Trading Centre by the defunct Ol’kalou town council. Further aware that the said plots have been allocated to two individual to the exclusion of the licensees, that is, the members of the public of Gichugo Trading Centre.
Concerned that the said licensees have developed the area and base their mean of livelihood here. Further concernedof the disruption of these people’s way of life and further concerned of the need to resolve the heightening dispute between the former employees and the new titleholders.
I urge this House do resolve that the ownership of the land be investigated and appropriate action be taken to establish the proprietorship of the said land and further appropriate measures be put in place to safeguard the interest of the members of the public who had the land licensed to them.
Speaker: Thank you member for Kaimbaga. I am also going to refer this matter to the House Business committee to get time for the motion in the course of next week. Resume your seat member for Kaimbaga. Next.
Clerk: There is another notice of motion by Hon. Kimani Njiraini.
Speaker: Hon. Kimani Njiraini member for Kaimbaga.
Hon. Njiraini: Thank you Mr. Speaker sir, I was thinking I would give the two notices at a go. But I won’t give them at the same time. I will follow the sequence of the order paper.Mr. Speaker sir I beg to give notice of the following motion: sorry.
Speaker: The motion is fully done on the order paper. Clerk you can give him an order paper.
Hon. Njiraini: Thank you. Mr. Speaker sir, I beg to give notice of the following motion:
That aware of the dumping of waste matter at Mihiga Trading Centre which has proposed but undeveloped sewerage management and disposal unit as no dumping pits nor sewerage beds have been put in place. Further aware that the matterfrom the dump is flowing to Karau River and causing serious environmental hazards to the consumers of water from Karau River to themselves and to their animals.
Concerned of the need to protect the consumers of the water from the Karau River and further concerned of the need to develop the sewerage and waste disposal units at Mahinga trading centre;
I urge this House to resolve that the issue of waste disposal and management at the centre to curb the flow and seepage to Karau River. I further urge that the House restricts further dumping of waste in the site until such a time as the pits and sewerage beds have been put in place toalleviate the escalation of further hazards to the people, animals and environment. Thank you Mr. Speaker sir.
Mr. Speaker sir I beg to give notice of the following motion:
Speaker: Member for Kaimbaga, I will also refer that matter to the House Business Committee to allocate time in the course of the next time when you can move that motion. Next order.
Clerk: Statements. Mr. Speaker we don’t have statements today.
Speaker: I think I can see another notice of motion. Ok. That is a motion. Next order.
Clerk: Motions .Mr. Speaker we have a motion by Hon. Rebeccah Nyangati.
Hon. Nyagati: Thank you Mr. Speaker sir. Mr. Speaker sir I beg to move the following motion that:
Aware that the youths in Nyandarua County compose of 25% of the county population and aware that 23% of the youths are jobless and have lacked adequate opportunities for jobs and wealth creation. Concerned of the high level of rampant crime, drug abuse and other social vices arising fromunemployment of the youths.Further concerned of the need to economically empower the youth through wealth creation and job opportunities.
I urge this house to ensure that the county policy framework is formulated and implemented and the bill be published for the purpose to ensure that the youths benefit from county government projects and a mandatory adequate budgetary allocation to at least five programmes involving the youths in all ministerial operations .
Understanding that, youth is not devolved. We are very much concerned with empowering the youths. As the education committee we feel that we need to look at other areas where the youths can benefit. I urge this house to make sure that a youth policy is fastened. Three to four months ago we come up with a youth policy. We were intending to have a youth’s bill. Right now we don’t have the youth policy as it is held up in the executive.
I wish for a situation where the youths will be classified into groups. We classify the youths according to their talents and interests of an individual. For long we have been classifying the youths to be those aged18-35years. We have been putting this entire people in one basket. We have heard of people who have the will to support the youths but they have been saying that we have them work out there as casual workers. We have involved the youths only in the odd jobs.
We can reclassify the youths and come up with a group of those who have income. I feel that these youths who have income should be supported to have SACCOs and try to save what they have. The other group is the educated youths. They have gone to colleges and universities. They have careers. These are the people who are looking for the jobs. We should make sure that 30% of the people employed in this county are the youths. The other group is the form four leavers. My feeling is; this people should be offered managerial skills and create various projects for them. The other group is the youths in the polytechnics. From the constitution, we understand that there are various parts of the youth that have been devolved that is the polytechnics and the sports. The youths centers have not been devolved and they still belong to the national government.
I feel that for the youths in the polytechnics we can empower them by offering them technical skills. I would wish to see a situation where we could support the youths and provide them with law materials. Create some warehouses for the in our County and the product we will have for them will be sold from the county government. We can have a common warehouse where we will do all this things. We market them within the county and outside. We can also have competition within the polytechnics in the county.
The other group is the sport men and women. I am very happy. We had a report from the CEC education, stating that: we should have the county teams in our county. That is a very good thing. A very good start because we are going to start afresh to indentify the individuals who have the talents. Who have the interest for sport and nature them for one or years. These people will go out there and have competition with other counties. They are going to have a career and a permanent one in that case.
We have the issue of tenders and I wish it is captured in the youth bill: Where the 30% will be for the youths and the women. It is important to say in this House even if 30% of the tenders are being advertised for the youths, we are not sure whether the people who are being advertised to are the people who are benefiting from it. We find that the people who are rich are the ones who are coming up with companies and business names, or they take advantage of the youths. They use another name for the youths and they apply for the tenders. The other thing I would wish this House would do, we have the sectoral committees: agriculture, education and ICT and we have the departments in the executive that stands for all this.
I wish to see a situation where we see the relevant department of the executive indentifying five projects for the youths. They should include them in their budget. It should be mandatory that every sectoral department indentify five projects for the youths and include it in their budget. If a ministry like agriculture, cooperative and everything has not included five projects for the youths. Their budget should not be approved. Why am I saying so? If the youth is not devolved, how will we be able to empower the youths on the ground.
I would wish to see a situation where in a department like agriculture reach a situation where they will indentify something like fisheries, bee keeping among others. They have those projects for the youths before the budget is passed. This way they will be able to identify group and support them. Then in the next budget they are not to support the same group but they will look for another specific group and support it.
If we look at the department of education, Understanding that the youths’ centres have not been devolved, they belong to the national government and we cannot interfere with something that belongs to the national government. I would wish to see a situation where we can come up with youth centres and call them the community centers. We can introduce some things like sports and put them in the education department. In cooperatives, we should have SACCOs for the youths. In ICT we can create resource centers in every sub county and the youths will have somewhere they will train on IT. That is my feeling Mr. Speaker sir. I call upon Hon. Ngotho to second.
Speaker: Member for Karau.
Hon. Ngotho: Thank you Mr. Speaker sir, I wish to second the motion that has been moved by Hon. Nyangati the vice chair ICT and also a member of the committee on education and social services. I don’t think that I have to say much as she has exploited much about the youths. She has discussed it in length. Maybe as I second. Let me state that the simplest group to deal with is the youth and also the most difficult group to deal with is the same, youth. The approach in which you deal with the youth is what will tell you whether you will walk together or they will work against you. How do you put them together? That is the basic thing. The most important thing is that we have to register youth groups. Let youth groups be registered. The groups must have common interest. There is that tendency during election campaigns where politicians who want to create a political mileage tend to register youth groups. That is not the way forward. If there are youths dealing with agriculture, let them get registered. If there are youths who want to give the cleaning services let them be registered.
Most of the projects in Gatanga constituency formerly lead by Peter Kenneth are done by the youths. The youths have been empowered. They do not have to beg in the streets for handouts. A very good example to us is Nakuru County. I think the education committee that is handling the matters of youths can go and visit Nakuru County. David Gakaria, the current MP has done very well for the youths; in sports, he has empowered them in activities that are economically viable. They are the ones who are doing the cleaning of the toilets and planting trees in Nakuru town. They have sheds where they sell most of the goods. Show them the way and they will follow that way.
In our CIDP, we had said that in every ward by the end of the last fiscal year must have a polytechnic. That is not what is on the ground. In as much as we might have a very good policy as she is asking for, everything depends on implementation. We have no polytechnics especially in my ward, I don’t have a polytechnic so most of the students, when they finish form four they have nowhere to go. Most of them are wasted. The wastage rate in Nyandarua County is 80%. These are children who are not able to join universities. In fact not even universities, any grade below C+ is what we call wastage in education. This is 80%. We ask ourselves where these numbers of children go to. We also had bursaries for the county. That is a good path towards empowering our children, but over one year is gone and nothing much has happened. The disbursement of even 10% has not been done. We gave them three hundred thousand shillings per ward. The seven million is still in coffers. Will it be a tendency now that when we come to the end of this fiscal year we use the funds for the last year? We get students in our offices asking for bursaries. We need to have a person to know these children are not in school. They need to be in school.
In the budget from the CEC education, he had suggested a revolving fund. This is a secret to help these children. We have a revolving fund in the national government. Under fourth schedule, the youth is not devolved. It is not either in the national government nor the county government. It is a responsibility of both governments to look after women and youths.
The county fund will go a long way. I can’t talk of the uwezo fund because I am not directly involved in it. I will talk of what I am involved in. The county government had suggested a revolving fund. I am not sure but to start with, it was 1.5 million to start with, subject to confirmation. I think it failed when it went to the budget committee. That was a very important initiative.
I am saying that youths should not be given handouts. You give them something as a member of the County Assembly and tell them “I am giving you to start a business.” They will close the business within a short time. If you give them a loan, they will have the initiative of paying back. I fit 9s not in form of a loan I am telling you, they will never pay. I have tried in my ward and I have been left mesmerized. I have started charcoal business for some youths, within one month they had closed shop. I have started second hand clothes in this Ol’kalou town and within two or three months they said they had closed shop. They were not selling. This is because you give them free money. If it is a loan and they are in a group they will take initiative to pay back.
It is needless to say about every department. Planning for the youths is a very important initiative. In agriculture they can capture green houses, this is a booming business. You give a group one good dairy breed and you tell them that they give back the calf to you after the mother sires. Those are the initiatives. Every department must plan for the youth. As the mover has stated, under industrialization we have the industries. How are we planning for the youths in this area? In Jua Kali we are giving them a loan to buy motorcycles. Those are the initiatives. This is a very simple initiative. If they are well implemented, we can do away with the problem of unemployment.