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{
    "id": 1063805,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1063805/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 172,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Wamatangi",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 646,
        "legal_name": "Paul Kimani Wamatangi",
        "slug": "paul-kimani-wamatangi"
    },
    "content": "Even more fundamental is on the question of whether the Committee resolved the question of Article 257, and whether this is a Bill that is promoted by the people of the Republic of Kenya, Sen. Omogeni was very clear when he said that the Committee of the Senate resolved that question. As we bring out our issues, it is also important for us to ask ourselves: Do we also want our Committee to have acted in vain? Having said that, I want to associate myself with most of the views that my colleagues have aired here. In recognizing that this Bill has proposed a spectrum of issues; so wide that one would say that it was a very daring venture to attempt to make amendments to the Constitution in so many aspects of it. However, the process has culminated in the Bill that we have today. Most of those issues have been dissected and a position arrived at. In my view, the Bill has addressed in that wideness of issues, specific issues that we should say firmly that since we promulgated our Constitution 2010, have been matters that still required the input of legal minds of deeper thinking. This is so that we can arrive at more current issues and positions that will help us make progress. I say so recognizing that, indeed, the Constitution 2010, envisaged that it is possible and allowable to amend it. I want to laud the team that started this process in recognizing that there are various gains in this proposed Bill. In the introduction of the new Article 11 (a), while we all know that the backbone of our economy is largely on the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) – the small traders and farmers – this Bill has proposed that we build an economic system that supports small and micro enterprises. I was one of the sponsors of a Bill in this House supports SMEs, to ensure that when the Government is doing its planning and funds are being allocated, there is a specific fund and kitty that goes directly to ensuring that SMEs are strengthened. Madam Temporary Speaker, one of the issues we have been grappling with all along is what responsibility we have, as citizens, to ensure that we have a country where corruption is dealt with finality. I also want to point at the new Article 18 (a) on the responsibilities a citizen. Most of the time we have been reduced to just complaining and making noise, but in this Article, it clearly spells out that it is now the responsibility of every citizen to practice ethical conduct and combat corruption. We do not have to sit here all the time and wait or ask what the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) or Directorate of Criminal Investigation (DC) are doing. Indeed, this responsibility is now constitutional to each one of us. Madam Temporary Speaker, in Article 89 (1) on the creation of 360 constituencies from 290, I will close the few remarks that I have on that particular issue. The other Article I may want to point out is Article 96 (3). In so doing, I want to remember as a Member of this House, who has sat in the County Public Accounts and Investments Committee (CPAIC) from 2013 to 2015. One of the things we had to combat is that immediately the Auditor-General’s first reports were tabled in this House, governors came together and proceeded to court. The then Governor of Nairobi proceeded to a court in Kirinyaga and obtained orders, which said that the Senate is only limited to oversight of funds allocated to counties by the national Government and has no role in resources that are collected locally in counties. This was a big blow."
}