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{
    "id": 111325,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/111325/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 280,
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    "content": "Surely, Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, history is going to judge us very harshly; that we had an opportunity to improve on this document, but we were not able to surmount enough courage to take our responsibilities head on! Instead, we chose to evade our responsibility on flimsy grounds that we cannot raise the numbers and say: “You know, we should allow this document! Oh! We are going to change it another day! Oh! You see!” Surely, Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, I am asking this House to rise to the challenge and responsibility that faces it squarely! I can see hon. Members have listed issues and we have all agreed that this document has deficiencies. We must rise up and improve on those deficiencies so that we can earn our places in history. Otherwise, if we sit here and say there is nothing we can do, we will have failed the test of leadership! Kenyans are waiting for this House to rise up and improve on this document. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, I want to suggest that the search for a new Constitution was premised on two aspects; one, that we give Kenyans the opportunity to decide; the opportunity to participate in decision-making at all levels so that they can influence their future and the way resources are being used. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, we have seen what bringing Kenyans on the decision table has done, in what has happened in the Constituencies Development Fund (CDF). We are saying: Let us create regions where hon. Members will have the opportunity even to go there and participate in the regions, because they are big enough for hon. Members to sit there and influence the development of our country. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, I ask myself: How many hon. Members sitting here today will agree to go and become councilors in the counties? How many? If, surely, we believe that the counties are the best place for us to devolve power, how many? Nobody! Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, I am saying that we must be serious if we sincerely want to develop this country. If we want to create other platforms where other Kenyans can contribute their efforts, talents and their expertise in the development of this country, let us create units that we, as hon. Members sitting in this House, can actually contemplate going to participate there, so that we can develop this country equitably! That opportunity beckons us; we must not run away from that opportunity! That is why we are sitting in this House. Nobody should tell us that we are just another organ of review. We are not! No other organ of review has the kind of mandate that we have in this House! No other organ of review has been voted for by the people of Kenya like this House! Therefore, it will be an indictment on this House that the document came to this House and we were so scared of our responsibility that we just allowed it to pass! How will we look? We will just be a footnote in history if we will have failed to assemble a two-thirds majority and improve on the document that has been brought about by the efforts of other Kenyans!"
}