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{
    "id": 108917,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/108917/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 1015,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Samoei",
    "speaker_title": "The Minister for Agriculture",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 204,
        "legal_name": "William Samoei Ruto",
        "slug": "william-ruto"
    },
    "content": "There are two issues here. Section 47 is very clear that to alter the Draft Constitution, you need the super majority. Nowhere in the Constitution, the Act, or the Standing Orders is there provided a super majority for the passage of a Motion. What hon. Abdikadir is about to stand here and move is a Motion. If it is a Motion because my reading of basic English tells me that Order No.8 is a Motion. Unless it is provided for in the Constitution that a certain Motion will require a super majority, it should be interpreted in its basic meaning that it requires a simple majority to pass. Mr. Speaker, Sir, secondly, please, exercise your mind. How is it possible that it can be said that for you to pass this document you need a simple majority and for you to reject the same document you need a super majority. It is the same document! Does it make sense? It is not written anywhere that you need a simple majority to pass this document. It is just the interpretation. What is written in this document is that you need a super majority, that is, 65 per cent to alter the Draft Constitution. It does not say anything else apart from that. We want to request you to find it in your interpretation and wisdom and assist this House access this alternative avenue. Indeed, there is an alternative avenue provided for in the Act. The framers of the Act, in their wisdom, made a provision that in the event this House faces challenges with this document, the way we have, we can relook at it. For us to access that provision, you need to interpret the provisions correctly so that we can go back to the Committee of Experts and the Parliamentary Select Committee who will iron out the issues. The document will come back to this House, and then we will take a document that unifies this country to the referendum. As I can see, we are actually setting the stage for a repeat of what happened in 2005, if we do not interpret the law in the correct way."
}