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{
    "id": 584351,
    "url": "http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/584351/?format=api",
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    "content": "Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, I congratulate my Chairman in our Committee, Sen. Mutula Kilonzo Jnr., for moving this Bill on behalf of our Committee. This is very important and it will empower people in our counties to have a mechanism within which they could exercise their sovereign rights that the Constitution provides in Article 1. Article 1(1) of the Constitution states that all sovereign power belongs to the people of Kenya and shall be exercised only in accordance with this Constitution. Secondly, Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, the Constitution provides that Parliament has a responsibility to do all that it needs to ensure that the devolved system of government functions. It is within the mandate of this Committee to legislate on uniform regulations, standards and processes that affect all counties across the country. Therefore, this Bill is within the jurisdiction of this House. I believe that it will give us an opportunity to empower our people; give our people a voice within which they could approach county assemblies. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, at the moment, there is a lot of work being done by county assemblies. However, there is also a lot of apprehension by members of the public that they do not know or have no access to what county assemblies are doing. This is partly because – for those of us who come from marginalised areas – you will find that most of our people have no access to internet, reading websites of county assemblies and ways of appreciating what their representatives debate. This House has a great advantage because we have live coverage. People listen to us whether on radio or television. As we empower county assemblies with a process of petition, it is also important that we also think through how best they can get to communicate to the public. That is why we talk about county assemblies being empowered to have resources, so that they run their own in-house televisions. If you remember there was a time we were in Mombasa with the media editors in this country, and one of the things they advised the Senate was that one can be able to do his own production and be able to broadcast online. Use YouTube, websites and so forth. I think our counties need to do that so that they can reach more people, we see the level of debates in that county; we see the capacity of the Members in representation of the people. One way of enhancing that representation is to enable the members of the public to petition. Such petition is important. This Bill is very brief but to the point; that it provides for the manner in which a petition must be presented to the House. It also provides for the procedure for presentation of that petition. I was listening to the Mover of the Motion and I believe it is important that petitions that come to Parliament or county assemblies, there should be no other processes going on whether in the courts or Commission of Administration of Justice or a tribunal or any other arbitration processes that might be going on, so that we do not have concurrent jurisdictions of different entities working on the same matter, and when you complete, you wonder because there is a decision may be by the Commission of Administration of Justice that is different, there is another decision that is from a court which is different and there is a decision of a county assembly which is different."
}