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"id": 1064901,
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Suba South, ODM",
"speaker_title": "Hon. John Mbadi",
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"legal_name": "John Mbadi Ng'ong'o",
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"content": "development, both political and economic. This will lead to forging a united, just and prosperous nation that we had envisaged when we forced the colonialists to leave this country for Kenyans to govern themselves. Hon. Speaker, allow me to, first, briefly discuss what we have in mind when it comes to the above issues before I delve into the constitutional Amendment Bill itself. I will not take much time on the constitutional Amendment Bill. The Mover has ably captured most of the areas out of the proposed amendments to the Constitution. On the nine issues that have been addressed, Hon. Members, you will appreciate that Kenya lacks — I want to start with national ethos — a sense of national ethos and is increasingly becoming a nation of distinct individuals instead of an individually distinct nation. We tend to be thinking individualistic instead of thinking of our country as an individually distinct nation. There is, therefore, need for us to define and subscribe to national ethos to foster unity, a sense of belonging, patriotism and pride. We need to take pride in our nation. We need to be patriotic to this nation. We need to have a sense of belonging to this nation. Long gone should be the days when someone leaves one part of this country and moves to another part and says he is going to Kenya. We should feel that we all belong to this nation as a people. Therefore, ethnic antagonism and competition are a major threat to Kenyan success and to the very continuity of our nation. Talking about inclusivity, Kenyans have for a long time expressed a keen desire for greater political, economic and religious inclusivity. In fact, inclusivity touches on those three distinct areas. We need religious inclusivity. Christians, Muslims, Hindus and even those who do not practise any faith should consider themselves as one nation. When it comes to political inclusivity, we want to see all Kenyans participating in political discourse in this country at the same level and people appointed to positions on merit regardless of which part of the country they come from. On economic inclusivity, I have just mentioned, and Members will agree with me that up to the advent of devolution, there are certain sections of this country which were receiving peanuts in form of resource allocation from the national Government. Even to date, you find inordinate disparity in allocation of resources to various regions. When people from some regions travel to Nairobi, they say they are coming to Kenya, as I have mentioned, those from the North Eastern region. Sessional Paper No.10 of 1965 marginalized and excluded a huge part of this nation from economic development. That is something that the BBI Bill is addressing. We need to follow it through with action. The mere presence of law in our statute books will not help. We have to act. As a fundamental principle, Kenyans have a right to seek and be protected by the state and by the law in pursuit of prosperity and happiness within our borders. You can read that from our National Anthem. No Kenyan should ever be victimized or considered a foreigner in their own country. Hon. Speaker, during the constitution making process, which was concluded in 2010, in our rush to adopt and mimic foreign models, particularly from the democratic West, we forged politics that is a contest of us versus them. We choose us and them on an ethnic basis. So, anyone who does not belong to your ethnic grouping is them. Those who belong to your ethnic grouping become us even when they are not useful and helpful in our lives. We need to ask ourselves whether this is helpful to the progress of this nation. This has led and contributed to the divisive elections that we have experienced in this country. We have associated progress and development in this country to who occupies the highest office in the land and the ethnic background of that particular individual. This leads to what we see after every election. The violence that is witnessed in this country is a manifestation of that “us versus them” principle which has not worked for this country, and, I dare say, will not help this country even going forward. Those of us who feel that the leaders who come from our areas will 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."
}