• He said there are noble government projects but the information around them are poorly unpacked for public consumption.
• He said there are noble government projects but the information around them are poorly unpacked for public consumption.
Image: COURTESY
Nairobi Senator Johnson Sakaja has decried what he described as the high-handed approach of the Jubilee government in implementing its policies.
Making his contribution at the floor of the Senate on Thursday, Sakaja claimed that there were top officials, some of them at the Cabinet level, who are hellbent on sabotaging President Uhuru Kenyatta's agenda.
He said there are noble government projects but the information around them are poorly unpacked for public consumption.
"I'm really at pains to understand what is going on with this government," he said, as he started his speech, adding that "I feel that there are elements in certain areas of government ....who are actually undercutting, undermining and sabotaging what he (the President) is doing."
He did not mention whom he was referring to.
In particular, the Nairobi senator took issue with the manner in which the government has been forceful in pushing its agenda among the citizens complete with threats of adverse actions.
"Why is the government acting as if it is at war with its people? Are we fighting Kenyans? What is going on?" he wondered.
"Today there is this tax. Tomorrow you are telling people there is 1.5 [per cent housing levy 'contribution'] you must pay or else, by force. Tomorrow you are telling car dealers [that] you must bring cars that are five years and under [yet] hundreds of young people are employed in these dealerships....or else."
"Tomorrow take this number or else. Why are threatening Kenyans?" he said, referring to the ongoing Huduma Namba registration which various government officials had insisted was compulsory without which citizens would not access government services.
State House denied registration was compulsory.
The High Court ruled that registration is not compulsory and no one should be denied government services for not having the number.
"You ask a question, you get arrested, taken to court and them tomorrow you are expected to go teach those children. I think there is something fundamentally wrong?" he added, alluding to the recent arrest of various KNUT leaders and teachers alleged to have disrupted training sessions for the new curriculum roll out.
Sakaja said there appears a trend that CSs have employed of being tough as a means of gaining popularity.
"Explain to Kenyans what you are doing, we are not children," he said.
On the ongoing squabbling surrounding the implementation of the new curriculum pitting education CS George Magoha and KNUT boss Wilson Sossion that have dominated headlines, Sakaja advised the abrasive minister to invoke reasoning and avoid confrontations.
He called for reasoning to solve the issues and controversies surrounding the roll out, challenging the House' education committee to take the lead in that endeavour.
Sakaja also called for a comparative analysis of the curriculum, using countries that have adopted it as case studies.