How Roots government will pay Kenya's debt in only 40 months

The story of Roots Party of Kenya is being told in many dimensions and our vision is lost in this. We are alive to the fact that leadership is both hard and soft. Hard being the legislations and regulations whilst soft being speaking to the hearts and minds of Kenyans.

The people are saying that it is not right that 5.5 million Kenyans are unemployed, with 1.2 million living below the poverty line of Sh220 daily.

Roots Party of Kenya's core agenda is to legalise and regulate marijuana for export purposes. Our regulation strategy is to create industrial hemp through seed reengineering; 0.3 THC or cannabis sativa (the psychoactive ingredient) and 0.97 CBD or cannabis fibre ingredient to make industrial hemp.

Agricultural officers will ensure that Kenyans grow industrial hemp of good quality while NYS will be assigned to man government hemp because there elements that can steal the produce as happens with avocado. Importantly all industrial hemp farmers will be registered and licensed.

Industrial hemp is used as a raw material in more than nine sectors to produce over 25,000 products. These include plastic, paper, cosmetics, bricks for construction, lubricants, food for example milk, cooking oil, flour, butter, protein powder and beverage, textile, furniture, automobile fibre for car bodyworks and headlights.

Kenya had 51.1 million mobile internet users by September 2017. I challenge Kenyans to do a Google search on hemp seed sales in Kenya. The results are awash with the availability of the product in the Kenyan market. The health benefits are clear as day.

Roots Party aims to run a profitable government, meaning that we will fund our projects using money made from the sale of industrial hemp. We assure Kenyans that we shall not increase taxes and the debt ceiling.

In fact, as Roots Party we will seek to clear our debt in the shortest time possible, lest our port that was used as collateral for the Chinese debt is auctioned like Sri Lanka's. Additionally, these returns will be used to give the much-needed 300 per cent salary increase to the police, teachers and all civil servants without resorting to further taxes and borrowing. 

How do taxes affect the common mwananchi? A clear illustration is the purchase of KPLC tokens worth Sh100. A Kenyan will get six units worth Sh48.37 while Sh51.63 will go to taxes.

How does debt affect the common mwananchi? Our total debt is Sh9 trillion or $71 billion. This means that a child conceived in Kenya today has a debt of Sh189,000. This situation is so bad that Parliamentary Budget Office that is mandated to independently scrutinise Treasury's expenditure plans advised the National Treasury to reschedule payments of domestic debts to ease the burden on taxpayers.

The loan is to be repaid in 30 instalments between January 2021 to July 2035. This means 14 years of high cost of living, poverty and unemployment worse than what we are experiencing today.

For this reason, Roots Party seeks to run a profitable government cognisant of the fact that we cannot tax the Kenyans further. We also cannot borrow more, hence this creative idea of legalising and regulating marijuana.

Is it a viable idea? In 2021, China, the sole financier of most of our infrastructural projects, alienated approximately 200,000 acres for industrial hemp cultivation and in four months made $1.2 billion. If we replicate the same here with the pilot project being the one million acre Galana Kulalu, it means we will have five times the land and automatically five times the returns - translating to $6 billion.

As our debt is $71 billion, it means it will be paid in 10 cycles of four months each translating to 40 months or in three years four months if we only focus on Galana Kulalu. In light of this Kenyans agree with me that the loan money used to build major infrastructure projects like the SGR, the express way was from Marijuana proceeds.

Another benefit of having this sustainable project in place is that it encourages people to accept that retirement is not such a bad thing. We know that many people fear the unknown and would rather stay in employment even in advanced age which has a negative impact in terms of employing the next generation of workforce. Legalising and regulating marijuana gives retirees an opportunity to join this business.

Our role as Roots Party of Kenya is to give a meaningful alternative. I leave Kenyans with a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson: "Among the map makers of each generation are the risk takers, those who see the opportunities, seize the moment and expand man's vision of the future". Roots Party is the risk taker in this context and we are seeking your vote to seize this opportunity as a country.