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{
    "id": 1065472,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1065472/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 101,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Nominated, ANC",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Godfrey Osotsi",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13172,
        "legal_name": "Godfrey Osotsi",
        "slug": "godfrey-osotsi"
    },
    "content": "There has also been a concern raised by some people as to whether this Bill is a popular initiative. If you read through this Report, it gives a very good historical background of where we started from. We started with divisive elections of 2017, where we had two leaders who got cumulative votes of 15 million Kenyans supporting them. When these two leaders in their own wisdom decided to have a handshake, which had an agreement signed through a joint communique between the two, that is where we started. For those who are saying that this does not qualify to be a popular initiative, I think they are not with us in this country. We have two leaders voted for by Kenyans with 15 million votes. Those 15 million votes were the people of Kenya. That is where the legitimacy of this Bill is coming from. This is a people initiative. Our role is to pass this Bill to the people in a referendum and Kenyans will make their decision known. I want to raise another issue that we have been hearing from the media. Last week, we were fed with information that some county assemblies passed Bills which were not authentic. If you read this Report, it is clear that Bills that went to county assemblies and were passed were authentic. More than 24 counties passed this Bill. I want to thank the Speaker of the National Assembly for being wise. He constituted a committee that came up with guidelines for delivery of the county assembly returns. Those guidelines were gazetted on 18th November 2020. They captured the possible administrative gaps in this process. All that has been captured in this Report. What we have been hearing in the media about some non-authentic Bills being passed by some county assemblies is not true. I am asking Members not to rely on rumors when they come to debate here. Read through the Report. Most questions that we asked yesterday are fully captured in this Report. Article 1 of the Constitution of Kenya says that all sovereign power belongs to the people of Kenya and shall be exercised in accordance with this Constitution. The second part says that sovereign power will be exercised directly or through democratically elected representatives of the people. The third part says that this sovereign power is delegated to three State organs, namely, Parliament, National Executive and the Judiciary. The Constitution under Article 94 gives this House the legislative authority derived from the people of Kenya and exercised by Parliament. Since we are not amending this Bill, but passing it as it is, it will not be right for any other individual or any other organ to shoot down the people’s initiative. I am saying that because Article 157 gives the Judiciary powers just the same way Article 94 gives us the people’s power. We also expect that the Judiciary will do the same and deliver this to the people of Kenya. It will be unfair that Parliament that represents the people of Kenya passes a document without amendments and then a judge, one person or a bench of judges, shoots down this initiative. It shall be unfair. Now that we have a new Chief Justice, I am asking our Judiciary not to take Kenyans in circles. Let us give Kenyans what they want to have. If I go to the substance of the Bill, Chapter 4 talks of privacy of citizen personal data. This is a very progressive provision because of where the world is going to. It is mandatory for countries under the United Nations to have a legal regime on matters to do with personal data. As we are aware, the country passed the data protection law and we have a data protection office. This is a very progressive amendment which I wish once the Bill is enacted into law, it should be implemented expeditiously. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, let me also talk about Chapter 6. It talks about the fight against corruption. It has recommended that corruption cases will be handled expeditiously. We know of corruption cases that have even taken 20 years like the Goldenberg scandal, the Anglo Leasing and others. We want to be clear that such cases should take a maximum of two years to 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."
}