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{
    "id": 1055626,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1055626/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 184,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Marakwet West, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. William Kisang",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2263,
        "legal_name": "William Kipkemoi Kisang",
        "slug": "william-kipkemoi-kisang"
    },
    "content": "There are a few amendments to this Bill. In Clause 2, the Member is proposing an amendment so that telecommunication companies running other businesses like financial services be split. I want to report to the House that the Companies Act No.17 of 2015 allows registered companies to carry out any other legal business other than what they have in the articles. The Companies Act is very clear, you can undertake any business. For example, if you register a company to do construction there is no law that stops you from doing any other business, so long as you get licences for the subsidiary businesses. The Kenya Information and Communications Licensing and Quality of Service Regulation, 2010 adequately provides for parameters for quality of service. The amendment proposes in Clause 3 that entities be penalised for poor quality of service. Already Regulation 2010 is covering this and entities are penalised up to Ksh500, 000 or 0.2 per cent of the turnover. So, in the Committee of the whole House we will propose to amend this. There are some minor amendments on commissions which the Bill is talking about. We have the Communications Authority of Kenya. Since the Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) has been overhauled, we will be making these small amendments to ensure the Bill is in conformity with the current status of the entity. In the proposed amendments, we are saying that for every call dropped, you will be paid 10 per cent. The Kenya Information and Communications Licensing and Quality of Service Regulations, 2010 has already provided for this. How do you record that you need to pay Ksh10 for each call dropped? This is not possible because Regulation 83A is taking care of this amendment. We have also realised that there are several regulations that have come to effect since 2014. Most of them because of new technology require some urgent audit, so we need to amend them. This means soon we will be partnering with the Committee on Delegated Legislation. So, we will go through an audit of about 10 Regulations which are in place as per the Communications Act and propose amendments to the Regulations to make them more effective. The Member is also proposing to change the use of Universal Service Fund. We know this Fund was set up by the industry to assist areas that are under cover in voice communication. We did an inquiry sometimes back about two years ago in 2018. We made recommendations to CA to ensure the under-served areas are covered."
}