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{
    "id": 101439,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/101439/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 255,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Ms. Mathenge",
    "speaker_title": "The Minister for Gender, Children and Social Development",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 77,
        "legal_name": "Esther Murugi Mathenge",
        "slug": "esther-murugi"
    },
    "content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I truly want to thank hon. Odhiambo for this Bill. We have worked closely with her in the Ministry and other stakeholders to see its birth. This Bill is long overdue. It will help us to take care of our children, especially the young girls and also Kenyan women. Currently, Kenya has no comprehensive law or policy addressing the issues of human trafficking. So, this Bill is long overdue. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, this Bill tries to address the issues which are missing in the legislation on counter-trafficking. It also tries to address issues on the numerous cases which are reported but no action is taken. It will, therefore, help the Judiciary to enforce the laws and also punish the perpetrators of trafficking. Human trafficking is a relatively new name, but a very old human rights violation. Because of the modern form of trafficking, it has been regulated for less than a decade and the concepts are still poorly understood. Indeed, when you tell many Kenyans that they are trafficking when they go to their rural areas and bring to the cities girls and boys who are below 18 years old, they do not believe it. But they are, indeed, trafficking. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, this Bill will also try to address and assist the victims of trafficking. That is why in the very last clauses, it creates a fund and also an advisory committee. The advisory committee will have a role of rehabilitating the victims, creating programmes for the victims and also helping the stakeholders in order to understand what human trafficking is all about. Human trafficking in persons has been defined as the recruitment, transportation, transfer and harbouring or receipt of persons by means of threat or use of force. It can also be by abduction, fraud or deception. Indeed, deception comes in when we tell our young girls that we are going to give them a better life in the cities and then come and make them house girls. So, this Bill is going to address that. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, why is trafficking so rampant? We know that it is because of poverty. That is a catastrophe that is affecting the whole country, but that does not mean that we have to traffic our women and children in order to combat poverty. The other cause is the parents. Parents have become lax in their role. We need to evaluate the role of parenting so that we can secure and be sure that our children are safe even in our homes. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the other cause is corruption. We have a lot of corruption. We have a lot of documents being falsified so that children are actually shipped out of the country. As hon. Odhiambo said, we even had to repatriate one of our children who passed through a children’s home and was sold in the United Kingdom. Fortunately, we were able to bring the child back. So, we also need to investigate children’s homes and what they are doing. This is because we have realized that many children’s homes say that they are helping the poor children of this country, yet it is actually a window for selling our children outside our boundaries. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the other reason there is a lot of trafficking is political instability. This is within our country. We experienced it during the post- election violence where we had a lot of women and children being trafficked for sex, so that they could obtain food and other goods in the camps where they are. That is a form of trafficking. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, even as we are opening our borders for trade, we must be very cautious because Kenya is currently called a transit, source and exit. If we are not careful, we can open not just the normal trade, but also trade in human beings. So, these are the things that this Bill is trying to look at and curtail. Currently, Kenya is classified under what is classified in the United Nations (UN) as Tier II. We have just recently moved from Tier III to Tier II. This is because we have started enacting laws that are protecting our children and women but more needs to be done. We need to do a lot more internally than externally. If you go to the Coast, you will find that there is sexual abuse. I want to tell Kenyans that taking care of the children is not the role of the parents, but it is teamwork. It is the role of every Kenyan to ensure that our children are safe and not sold out. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we have also in the past had a lot of cases where girls have gone to Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries and come back either in coffins or with broken limbs. We need to look at this and make sure that laws are enacted so that our children are safe. Our country is also a transit point because many Chinese, Indian and Pakistan women transit through Nairobi. That leads to exploitation in the European commercial sex trade centers. So, we need to do a lot of work to ensure that we do not just pass this Bill, but we put all kinds of enforcements in place. I want to go back and say that when this Bill was being prepared, my Ministry, Ministry of State for Provincial Administration and Internal Security, Police Department, Ministry of State for Immigration and Registration of Persons and Ministry of Labour were all involved. We felt that this was a Bill that required each and every person to be enacted. However, although I am supporting this Bill, I will, at the opportune time, have some two slight amendments. One is that since the Bill deals with human beings and my ministry also deals with human beings, we will want the secretariat to be housed within the Ministry so that we can work together. On the issue of the Fund, we need to look at it and work out modalities of creating a Fund so that those who are victimized can be rehabilitated. What has been happening is that, once they are saved from the perpetrators, we do not do anything to them. We leave them out in the open. We need to create rehabilitation centers where we can put them and rehabilitate them so that they can fit back into the society. We also need to ensure that the judges and Kenyans at large understand what human trafficking is all about. The elite in Kenya--- In fact, in December, when you visit the rural areas, you will be amazed by the traffic of young children who will be leaving the rural areas and coming to urban centers to look for greener pastures which, in most cases, are not greener but forms of slavery. I beg to support and I look forward to working with hon. Ms. Odhiambo on this Bill."
}