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{
    "id": 1195307,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1195307/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 151,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Kikuyu, UDA",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Kimani Ichung’wah",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "notice that all the Departmental Committees have an average of 15 Members. The Majority Party has eight Members and seven slots are given to the Minority Party. However, Standing Order 174(1) requires that the Committee on Selection, in nominating Members to serve in a Select Committee, shall ensure that the membership of each committee reflects the relative majorities of the seats held by each of the parliamentary parties. We made sure we did that. It also states that not two Members of the House Business Committee will serve in the same Departmental Committee. We also ensured that there is no Member who will contravene this particular provision unless the House resolves otherwise. Hon. Speaker, it is also a requirement in our own Standing Orders, as amended in the last days of the last Parliament, to provide that at least one Independent Member is nominated to serve in the Special Funds Accounts Committee. That was also there in the 12th Parliament, but the new requirement is that, at least, we must ensure that our Independent Members are represented. This time we have 12 Independent Members and they had 10 slots that were reserved for them in line with the Standing Orders. All those Independent Members have been catered for. Both the majority coalition and the minority coalition have been magnanimous enough to ensure that they adhere to the Standing Orders to accommodate the Independent Members in line with Standing Orders. It is also a requirement that those parties that do not constitute parliamentary political parties are taken care of. It is worth noting that many of the non-parliamentary political parties are affiliated with the Kenya Kwanza Coalition because Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), WIPER Democratic Movement and Jubilee are parliamentary political parties. On this side of the divide, we have quite a number of parties that do not constitute parliamentary political parties. Within our coalition, we ensured that we allocated the slots reserved, in line with our Standing Orders, for the non-parliamentary political parties to all the parties in the coalition. Hon. Speaker, another important thing I want to point out to Members is that Principal Secretaries may be nominated. If we pass this Motion today, we expect His Excellency the President to be naming Principal Secretaries in due course. Therefore, these committees will carry out the exercise of vetting them. Hopefully, before His Excellency the President nominates the Principal Secretaries, the Clerk’s office has indicated it will organise a calendar for election of the leadership of these committees. We expect this will start early next week. The issue raised by Hon. Irene Kasalu should be directed to a committee where that kind of business can be transacted. Of course, we expect that in line with the pronouncement by His Excellency the President on the Supplementary Budget, that the National Treasury is in the course of preparing it. We expect to quickly constitute the Budget and Appropriations Committee to consider any Supplementary Budget that may be sent our way. Hon. Speaker, you will also remember in your communication last week or early this week, you talked of the appointment of the Inspector-General (IG) of Police, who needs to be vetted by a Joint Committee between the Senate and this House. We will not vet him if we do not constitute these Committees. Hon. Members, should note that after we elect our chairpersons and vice- chairpersons… The Committee on Selection went through a very rigorous exercise to place Members. I want to persuade Members that they may not get the committees they were looking for. Opportunities will arise following the election of chairpersons and vice-chairpersons; more so, where somebody is elected as a chairperson and had been designated either two or three committees. This is because in line with our Standing Orders, no chairperson of a committee is allowed to be a Member of another committee. Considering we have 20 Departmental Committees, this tells you we have 20 slots that may fall vacant if a chairperson is elected and was in another committee. The same with Select Committees, if one is designated and elected 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."
}