 Hello, Athena. Many thanks for tuning in to Y254 News Highlights. It's the 20th of May 2019. Many thanks for joining us tonight. Discussion Monday will be looking at how we can unite Africa on development and create a corruption-free continent. I'll be speaking to our panelist of Honoreboos here from my left. I have Hussein Ghadane from Garisa County, Honorebo Chege Wa Maratu and Chris Mack, Honoreboa as well, so keep it Y254. You can join our conversation by sending us your comments on all our social media platforms at Y254 channel. At Morani Hillari is my Twitter handle. You can also ask questions to my panelists tonight and put your questions or what you would want to hear in terms of development, what has been done in our country and what you expect more. So, welcome to the program. My name is Nereva Hillari. We move straight to our discussion and I want to begin with a project that will be uniting Kenya and other three countries and that is Kenya, Ethiopia and Sudan, which is the Lapset. Good evening gentlemen. Good evening. Karebunisana. Asante. It's good to have you here. Now I want to begin with you Chege. Yes. We have the Lapset, which is the Lamu Port and Sudan Ethiopia Transport, which is the Lapset Project and it will open up a passage for an increase of trade opportunities with Kenya's northern neighbors, that is Sudan, southern Sudan. And Ethiopia. And now, how do you think this project will lead to opportunities in multiple areas of Kenya? Thank you very much, Hillari, for having me. Thank you for today. For the viewers, my name is Chege Amarato, I'm from Nenaroa County. I'm a CEO of the Moja Foundation, an NGO and also a director of public policy and special programs autism lights. Our work is to create awareness and increase acceptance on matters of autism. The project will really help us because here we are here speaking as the youth of this country and the youth of Africa. The project is a plus to our country and Africa at large because we will see many people get employed, many youth getting involved in it. And I think it's a good thing that we should all support as East Africans. Yes. All right. Who's saying Garisa County is one of the ESL counties in Kenya and I believe that this project would probably benefit the people. But according to you, how do you think the opportunities will be created in the northern part of Kenya? And thank you, Hillari, first of all, for having us, like my brother said here. The project on Lapset is very fundamental for our people. Actually, Garisa is one of the towns that passes the Lapset all day from Mojale. So as the pastoral community, we agreed, set and agreed at a level with our community and with our leaders. We actually paved the way for the Lapset to go through because we are a pastoral community. We entirely do the livestocking for our animals. So we barely don't have any land to give since we are pastoralists. But again, we understood through civic education, through awareness, through public participation, the importance and the magnificence that we can have if the Lapset goes through. That's why as a community from Garisa and a pastoral community, we paved the way for a Lapset in our community land. Because also in the constitution, the county government shall act on behalf of the national government as far as the land issues concern. So therefore, as a community, we are welcoming it. And the youth of that county are very vibrant because 60% of the population in my area are youth. So we welcoming it. Speaking of the youth and your county, I'm looking at it this way. What has already been done in terms of creating awareness and how are the youths equipped? Because we have seen the construction of SGR, where it will go through. We haven't seen much done about the community, the involvement in terms of constructing it. Now how are the youths in Garisa County equipped to ensure that if the Lapset now gets to the corridor, they will work on it themselves? First of all Hilary, over 80% of the manpower in Garisa youth. And of course now we are sorting some issues with the Lapset themselves because they were areas to do the composition. But they used to be headache from long time ago if Lapset or Kenha passing anywhere. Everybody is taking a place so that they get the money out of it. But this time the policies are very different. The national government who are dealing with matters of Lapset will directly fund the county government. Who are now trusted on behalf of the national government. Now the government will pay to the people because they identify their people so well. We have been having those issues lately. But I can tell you the people on the desk were the youth. The people are advocating for each and every word that passes through the Lapsets are the youth of this county. And to be honest with you and from where I come from we take public participation very seriously. Because in the constitution only the word public participation itself is mentioned 16 times in the constitution. It's like a Bible or a Holy Quran. See that's how we seriously take matters of public participation. Alright, I'll take your word and hope we will not have stories to do with the youths claiming they have not been involved in the Lapset project. Now Chris, how do you think the Lapset project will provide opportunities to the youth? You come from Lekepia and I know your county produce goods. And we hoping to take them to Ethiopia already when Southern Sudan. Very much. Thank you once again Hilary. In fact when we talk of issues of uniting. I look at it in two approaches. You cannot first of all unite a hungry youth, right? So when I looked at the master plan when they came up with the idea before the former president retired. There was the establishment of the resort cities in most of the major stopovers even in Garisa. Apart from the works and everything of that. The small entrepreneurs will be in these resort cities. We want them to be youth. This would be a very first opportunity for them. And once they empower that way, we are empowering and uniting at the same time. And once a youth is able to fail for themselves, it's easy to talk of unity. The other issue, if you look at the passageway of the Lapset, it passes places which are a bit arid. Which have been prone to conflict, cattle wrestling. Lekepia has the issues of cattle wrestling. So I tend to relate a lot with counties where the Lapset would pass. So if we can make sure it passes there, it brings development. And some cultural practices which have been bypassed by time will be sorted with this modernization. So I look at it in those two aspects. And maybe the third thing, I think the chair of the Lapset is Ambassador Motaura. So for it even to be very effective. I don't know what they would have done, but we need the youth also. Not as chair, but part of the team that is driving the whole process. So at least when you're doing even that whole great project, we can get the youth mentality involved. So I think on those two approaches, it would lead in the uniting of the youth and even creating those opportunities. You speak of the youth and in the recent past we have seen the youth being claimed to be not well equipped, they have no leadership skills. They can do that, they are corrupt. How do you expect the youth to be in such panels to ensure that the projects that the government proposes, we will have youth who will spearhead the agenda of the government of the time? Okay, first of all, okay, so making an excuse for them. If these youth are corrupt, I think they've learned from, they say, but be as it may, let's not say that it's youth. Yes, they have looked up to this older generation and thought that is the way. But be as it may, we cannot say we are not going to deny this youth such capacities and positions of empowerment and growth because of that perception that the youth are corrupt. So it find is only a few, but if we'd expand these spaces we'd get youths who are role models, we've seen them. I won't mention names, but we've seen them and I would mention it look like I'm biased towards some person, but we've seen when a youth is given a position, they are those who with the proper molding, proper mentorship, they are doing great things. They just need that space and they need better role models because probably then they are looking at this older generation that that is the way, so then it left the tag behind and the youth are also corrupt. What's your opinion on that? We are the youth, we sit here in Hussain. We are the youth. It's not every youth that is corrupt. The youth are corrupt as we say it because you've seen how you wake up in the morning and you see 20 billion is gone. And yourself, you're there with all the depression and problems that you're facing. What will you do? I'm not saying that it's a good thing but my take is if this youth, our youth can be empowered, can be given capacity building and be shown the way they can lead in so many positions in this country because as we say we are not too young to lead, you understand? We have skills, we are able to lead in any capacity, in any position in this country and that's my take. Orabusini, I want us to digress a little bit because they have been said to be corrupt and now they have moved to something different to get them something because we saw in 2017-2018 there was a statistics where the youth wanted things to happen to them very fast. They needed things to happen to them within a snap of a finger. But now they have moved to betting because they believe here we will get the money. And we have seen so many youth go to betting. We have seen them get wasted in drugs. We have had cases in the coast where most of the youth are in drugs so it is happening even in Nairobi and we are speaking of where we can only see how about in the rural areas where we have the youth who have got lost in alcoholism. What do you think should be done? First of all on matters of corruption of youth I think if an elderly person embezzles money in the country we call it corruption but if a youth embezzles money we call it just taking because we are the majority and when you want to shop you have to take something from the money and return it. That is my opinion because in Africa Kenya is I think number 3 in youth population at 20.3%. Back in the country we have about 56% of the voting block. That is already 50 plus 1. When you are not including us in your decision making tables what do you expect? Initially before I come to the other question they said there is something called building bridges initiative. So the main cause of the building bridges initiative was to bring together the communities the people who fought during the election period and who fought more than the youth. If you go to the police station if you track record go to the hospitals the youth are the fundamental and people are misused during the election period and there is no single person single member of the youth. I think the youngest person on the committee on building bridges is 55 years of age. See, those are the kinds and that is not a youth according to our constitution. Yes, so those are the things we go through and if you see the crime rate drugs you are talking about it is just going through all the time. And what of that Hillary? Also as we are setting an example of this country we might be seated here looking like we are wearing suit and all that but we have vijana. So as we are doing what we can to prove the country that we can be trusted. We can do great things. If you can see what Moshimo Krismak is doing in his county and Dagane here they are proving that we can do we can do great work we can be trusted as youth. You understand? So this thing of saying that we won't give this position to a youth because youth when they are given they steal, they do what they learn from their fathers. Myself inherited a lot from my father. So I think us as a youth we are setting a pace where we are and that's what I'm saying we don't have to be in those position for us to lead. You understand? We start from where we are then we can get to the other pace to the other space. All right. Let's touch on another project. Now Krismak the Kenya Airports Authority is in the midst of building a shopping mall, a hotel, business zone and commercial passenger terminal at JKIA. Now this terminal would provide successful binding companies with equipment and materials for improvement to Kenya's airport. Now will this development increase the flow through Kenya flow of people to Kenya through such places or developments? Yes, I would think so because I've had a chance to travel to other airports and I was, you can see the international standards that is there and once something, perception is always playing around everywhere in the world that airport looks, the standards it is, it looks safe. So anybody wants to come to Kenya or rather to go and transit through feel safe. The other thing, at least after the election we were able to stabilize the economy, we were able to calm down the temperatures. So the room for traffic of tourism is also more and these malls maybe we can touch on them. You know when I was young and we would go to the airport we would see everybody who was, they were calling them the duty free shops. They were made to look like a privilege for the, like the names you'd hear like partner owns a few and some other really prominent guys. If that project were to come, let it be put in a way that you know we are also giving priority to also the young investors and the youth to also be part of this stalls and everything there. There is one they've put there but if you go and see the good will they are asking for youth. Now where is the youth going to get good will? So as much as we want this airport to grow, have diverse business, have more variety in terms of duty free things, we must make sure that it is accessible to our youth. Because at times the opportunities are there but we make a big bridge towards them. Our youth feels like this is not my category, I will not be able to get a shop there. Honourable thing, is Kenya becoming intra-regional hub for infrastructure through that? And maybe talk about Chris Maxid. I think he is privileged to go to the airport when he was a kid. The last time I set a foot in the airport was 19 years old. I am a Kenyan already but that's to him anyways. Chris Maxid is also meeting some other organizations which are launching Ajira. Ajira is an app so that the youth can set their CVs, their resumes, what they can do. Then they will be taken online. I think he will talk about it on his free time because in Kenya now we are approaching a times of making use of the internet usage. If you go to Facebook you will see so much online and links. I also buy watches from that place. It's so much easy. In America in the 80s, 70s they say before the new technology 50% of their population were in their farms producing food for their families and for their countrymen. But now since the new technology came only 3% of their people are in their farms which are producing surplus for the entire world. I was seeing some other research very funny one and actually 4.8 billion people have funds and 4.6 billion people have toothbrush. So you can imagine if you don't make use of your phone currently as a youth no one is coming for you. The thing I like about Kenya is that we are facing we are approaching that momentum towards the new technology and IT. We might talk a lot about the youth the technology is very important these are our phones we have WhatsApp and I'm happy with a group I saw a group that has created an app where you can youth in urban area can start doing farming it's called aquaponic or something. You don't need a big mass of land for you to start doing potatoes I think as youth who are watching youth of this country should start using their mobile phone to make money. So if we make money we keep talking about corruption we keep talking about opportunities of the youth but we can also create our own opportunities through social media. I've seen another young man called Dennis he's a Facebook DJ and he makes a lot of money advertising on his page and he's making money he wakes up in the morning he starts mixing he's receiving cash you understand so it's high time we start becoming creative we start stop depending on the government because to be honest if we depend on government we've already seen it has failed us in so many ways you understand youth are very youth of this country are depressed you know, come on someone said vijana hawa na kakitu kumfuko and if you don't have kakitu kumfuko how will you even take your girlfriend for a date so and these are our girlfriends they in this level of social life and all that you want to keep to that pace so you become depressed that you are seeing youth are killing each other questions of crime you see like in my county Nandarwa just saw the other day on BBC 70% suicides guys are killing each other because for a man for pride to come on how many I'm able to provide for my family I'm able to pay for school fees for my kids I'm able to take my wife for a ride or something if I cannot achieve those things then we have a problem it's a timing bomb so let us be creative let us use opportunities that we have there social media and for once youth we stop complaining too much let's come together because once we are united as African youth we can do a lot we can do a lot before you respond on this Chris there has been a question of helping the youth in terms of providing the youth fund and the ways of fund that was there maybe you can make a comment on that what has happened are the youth benefiting? even before I go there whenever I hear things of agriculture even what you said about the airport it's always good at least when we come here we also talk a bit about evolution because it has opened the spaces because as that airport is expanding it is just the other day when we had the devolution summit that Kiriniaga was able to say that now they are selling their coffee direct to they even have I think a shop at the New York so when this airport expands it means even cargo is going fast the other day like Kipia was able to sign a memorandum of agreement with the Kenya airport no, KQ Kenya Airways so they can get their flowers from the flower farms they are direct and this is happening across board and I know it's gonna pick momentum so we want when that momentum picks and there is flooding of such goods for regional markets for export and that we want the airport to be able to also handle that so that plan by KIA and I hope they also manage themselves so I know there's been the issue of mismanaging the airport and the national curia so on the issue of the youth fund they are really doing a lot but I still feel there should be more because I get to go to the ground I find youth having very massive innovations like there's a youth in Kipia he's building local fridges he's building local fridges for the arid places like Kipia where it can be powered by solar but all he needs is a certain fund in fact he tried the government fund it was too much he couldn't get because of the bureaucracy he ended up benefiting from the one given by the United Nations framework for climate change and how could that be easy and that one is an international one why can't we make the local one and that one I think the headquarters is in Bonn, Germany and that is how he's been able to boost so that one is there there needs to be more awareness they need to cut the process and again the issue of the plan to merge these funds that one I always say let's approach it with caution because we're going to put the women fund the youth fund and other funds together so it's going to be a scramble so as in my opinion I always want it to be independent if it's for the youth I'm not saying our youth are not organized but you can imagine whenever you put one place with the women and they are our mother as soon as they find their organizational skills and they want to take these loans and of course we can bet who will be favored but still on the same point do you think what have you been doing in your county in terms of policies to ensure that the youth will benefit and reduce this bureaucracy you have to go to this place you have to come and such things what have you done in your county in Likipia we have a youth fund it was started in the previous government the fund until now is the last allocation was around 40 million what we made sure that at least let's get a body that is at the ground and there are many proposals because the youth felt they cannot come all the way from Likipia North if we come to Likipia North we get the marginalization fund courtesy of that constitution because it's really marginalized how will the youth come from that place to come to Nanyuki Onyahuru Towns to get alone at the bank so we work to the circle last year when I was there we passed let's give the local circles because there is a way these circles are penetrated they are there at the ground in every center so that is one of the ways we cut those bureaucracies to make sure that this youth can go to the circle and access this and then we tried as much as possible to reduce things about at times we tell them collateral as youth does not even have a title especially in Likipia there is no title need because they are still holding on to allotment letters so with that it helped there are challenges a bit of mismanagement but as a county we are handling it and that really helped because if I look at the amount which was taken from 2017 to now it is 80% as compared to the other years when the money had to go back to the exchequer once the financial year would end 100% you had a comment before Chris stopped I picked for my brother Chege On it is easy to watch a complaint the independence we are joining as Africans right now it is brought about by young guys at the moment when he was leading United Gold Coast Conversion Party he was in his studies this game goes for Patrice Lumumba he was in 33 when he was leading the Congolese National Movement the Sinfoni Rere on Tano if we are enjoying the fruits of independence brought by young people at that time who are we to complain that's what I wanted but the one on the revolving fund I can also proudly tell you guys my committee that I'm the vice chair on enterprise development we just concluded our bill on revolving fund for the youth women and persons with disabilities was also enshrining the constitution on 55 and 54 and I can tell you that we are done with the regulations the money the youth are organized and we are waiting to benefit from that money and actually in terms of employment actually we created committees on sub counties to manage we are calling it the revolving fund committee on sub counties so we were putting each committee of representative of the youth representative of the persons with disabilities and gender in that manner and I can tell you it's employing more than anyone and at least when I leave office that would be my legacy because that bill is entirely my baby from the beginning I want us to finish up with the part of development we have SGR for an example that has worked between Mombasa and Nairobi now there is that phase 2 naivasha and we are hoping it will get to Kisumu but now I'm looking at the eastern Africa opening up places like Uganda Rwanda Burundi but then as a nation do you think we will have a good integration between Kenya and other regions? yeah I think so but it's of course there will be so many challenges but for me I want it to happen because one it will be so easy to do business between our 3-4 countries you understand and the opportunities which are out there but even before I comment father I think for me I have a solution for corruption which is happening in this country and this is my opinion I think even when us as Christians and my brothers are Muslim and happy Ramatan we believe when Jesus came and he died for us our sins were forgiven you understand and this is what I want to say if we can forgive everybody we can forgive everybody you know right now there is a who I wouldn't mention name corruption, corruption, king of corruption king of poverty and all that if we can just forgive everyone and say that if you stole I'll come to gold if you ever taken anything or if you ever did corruption from today henceforth you are forgiven and then these people because this man their bedrooms the heading in their girlfriend's houses it will circulate and it will finish a lot of problems be forgiven because no one will return corruption money you understand no one will return corruption remember even the system that you are using to fight corruption they are also corrupt in some way you understand so if we forgive everybody and say you are all forgiven we would go and then suspend this law you know right now you can't even bank a million you will have to fill a whole dictionary so let's suspend this law for one year and forgive everybody but if you are caught from 2019 henceforth that way this money will circulate these people who have stolen this money will start billing malls they will create employment to our young people this money will start going on to Mamamboga because right now if you go to Mamamboga they are stressed, they are depressed there is no money so the solution for this country is to forgive everybody and let people use their money so that it's 2019 may you have said they will be forgiven do you know 2020 next year someone else will come and say and then from next month I use a very good example of Jesus we are all forgiven we want to be careful to see him so if the laws are made that if you are caught from now henceforth adaka wibakalami amutu unenda jela fuguda kuna kese ya kuna manenu mimi 50 million 50 million 50 million if his law will take effect I can tell you Kenya will be 10,000 people because everyone is correct majority is not called we are going to close more counties we are going to close more counties now that you have moved me to corruption does inequality bring corruption in our country in terms of the inequality job opportunities resources distribution or supply does it bring corruption in our country that's the fundamental way of giving out tenders and projects Nairobi is not a town where you can walk in and get opportunity just the way they are you have to do something at some point according to labour regulations in the world it is just evident that African youth are employed unemployed maybe these small businesses the normal hustling for youth to do I mean that would be okay it could be free system but in Nairobi in the town in the country we are living in you cannot just walk in somewhere and get a soft landing never it never happens in this country actually Honorable Chris we have been having scandals we have been speaking of dams now we have the gold and we have cases in kut would we say the judiciary is becoming an impediment to fighting corruption and if not are our security or the agencies that have been trusted to ensure that they have done due diligence and investigations are they doing enough what's the problem first the problem is even apart from the judiciary most of these organs have their challenges and as much as the judiciary has their challenge it must work in tandem with the police so you found even the inspector general of police and the DCI saying that yes they are officers from our our areas who are actually working with these gold smugglers and the fake gold sellers and all that and they were actually the transfados suspended it's something that was there in the paper and all that the same the judiciary has admitted to in fact the JSC the other day gave directions for some judges to actually get fired so those challenges are there and it's a time like this war corruption has been it has never come to light in my age and all that to be fought this aggressively so the other impediment is that there is so much politicization we see it that this issue is coming it's being fought then the next thing you hear people fighting the office that is fighting that or rather it starts to handle that so the office loses focus and let me not lie we are politicians people fear us especially people who are officers who have to go through vetting by us so when they go to a rally and say something that touches on my office I have to go slow and you know there are challenges before this scandal is sorted you hear there is another one they talked about the dams now it's the gold we don't know what else will come it's touching almost now there was a guy who was very tough I wouldn't mention him now he's been mentioned on this what do you think will happen if really he was in it so we'll start forgiving the others we'll go round round round that's what I'm saying the solution is that we need some international relations once they train for East African kicks off we need a good rapport with every country in the world for Kenya to develop right now we have issues with Dubai we have few people you are Kenya what we do where we export we do everything even my friends who are from Isli their business is mostly in Taki and in Dubai so if you cause labor relations because of your anger you're going to bring problems between nations people just need to be human for once everybody be human and do the right thing that will be the best thing to do for this nation he mentioned of people being fired now Chege as we wind up do you think firing people who have been mentioned in corruption is something that should continue is it enough I think that's a first step let's fire these people who are mentioned in these corruption scandals first step aside whether you're guilty or not step aside so that it will make the other person who will come and occupy that position be careful number two I want to talk to African youth as we wind up because in Africa general Africans we need to know that today Africa is the most richest continent in the world you understand I support what Kagame said present Kagame we are borrowing even things that we don't even we have here you understand so we need now to start embracing our continent and start protecting you see like those golds you are mentioning others that we never mentioned I saw report the other day about five trillion kilos smaggold through Dubai and all that where do that gold come from? Congo look the way Congo is guys are dying of Ebola and this Ebola we know is fixed by some people you understand we saw the other time it's unconfirmable it might be true trusted agency truck had got an accident and they find minerals you understand this minerals are coming from Africa today every medicine in the world comes from Africa then goes to the other side then we are given one percent as aid and then we are like yeah yeah yeah you understand so we need to start developing our Africa for Africans we are saying your final comments as we wind up final comment is that the use of this country we need to focus we are sick and tired of people making decision for us and we should stop being cheap on doing campaigns we should fight for our rights all the time and you know people died but like Patrice Numumba he was shot dead by firing squad he was used at that time so we need to bring the coveredness out of our hearts and focus all right final comments just to echo infact what my brother said we are a country this country we are the one who is going to inherit it we do not want a bad name for a country so whenever these people in this fake gold smangol let them not be our heroes these are echo to my fellow youth be your own hero if you can't get a better place hero or rather a better placement because like he is right the next team will start being placed the same way as some certain countries in West Africa they cannot do business with them you cannot get trusted so the other thing is this he talked about the stepping aside the same politician who has been mentioned and he is a senior leader from western there is a time he was mentioned some fears back in another scandal he did a very honorable thing which I had never seen before he stepped aside to be investigated and when the investigation was done he was found clean he appointed him back so let's see this happening let's not cheer let's not take sides because at the end of the day I am seeing a scenario where we are following these people blindly and in fact I always think like if you see the way the particular mumbas of the yester years if you see the JFK these people who are very young and taken on serious parties we are not seeing it happening nowadays so let's stand up and let's take these opportunities let's not complain let's be innovative let's be creative in our approach we need to rebrand our country and Africa at large because this is a challenge to the media because also media is failing our nation big time because every morning you wake up first page is gold scum tomorrow a hotel we are bombing and all that there are so many young people who are doing great things there is a lady who won global citizenship and she is just 21 years old we never saw that on a front page there are other people who are doing great things myself have donated over 300,000 pairs of shoes I have never seen it on a front page so wake up is negative energy so I am challenging the media also to wake up and rebrand our country because today donors are afraid to come to Kenya because of the bad things happening in our country because of the branding which is not alright so many things for coming they have been my guest Chris Mark Honorabu Chege and Honorabu who seeing many things for keeping us company coming up next is why Mashariki I see JTISKA already I will see you on Friday many thanks for keeping us company my name is Dereva Hillary have a good night