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{
"id": 1054079,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1054079/?format=api",
"text_counter": 285,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Homa Bay Town, ODM",
"speaker_title": "Hon. Peter Kaluma",
"speaker": {
"id": 1565,
"legal_name": "George Peter Opondo Kaluma",
"slug": "george-peter-opondo-kaluma"
},
"content": " I am moving the Law of Succession (Amendment) Bill (National Assembly Bill No.75 of 2019). This is a very small proposed amendment to the Law of Succession Act, but an amendment with very far-reaching and material consequences. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker and Hon. Members, I am largely looking to amend Section 29 of the current Law of Succession Act. If Members would care to look at the current Section 29 and how we are redrafting it, this is what we seek to achieve. A look at the current Section 29 indicates that husbands, where wives die, are not entitled to seek inheritance of their wives’ estate unless they can go to court and prove that the wife was maintaining them or they were dependants of the wife. The current Section 29 is, in terms of categorising or defining dependants, only limited to wife or wives, or former wife or wives. What I am doing at the first level, Hon. Members, is to remove “wife or wives, or former wife or wives” and having in their place “spouse”, so that whether you are a husband or a wife and your partner is dead, as a spouse, you may be entitled to succession. If you look at the amendment I am proposing, I am also deleting the current Section 29(c) which says: “Where the deceased was a woman, her husband will only be a dependant if he was being maintained by her immediately prior to the date of her death.” So that when my wife dies, I pray that does not happen, I do not need to prove that I was depending on my wife, the property of my wife is a property I can, as a spouse, seek to administer for the benefit of our family and children. Essentially, I am removing the discrimination in terms of the architecture of the current provisions of Section 29, so that either spouse, whether a husband or a wife, can seek to inherit, not that for a husband, you only seek if you prove you were a dependant. If you look critically at this amendment, at Section 29(a), the manner in which the spouse or wife or wives, or former wife and wives, are defined is very vague. It may lend itself to things which are not appreciated or accepted in our legal regime. Things like gay marriages and lesbianism, can be accepted under this broad definition. That is why I am also proposing an amendment to the definition of “spouse”. What I have proposed there, before I say much about the The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}