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{
    "id": 1211236,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1211236/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 233,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Embakasi West, JP",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Mark Mwenje",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1429,
        "legal_name": "George Theuri",
        "slug": "george-theuri"
    },
    "content": "take up the position. It is important that we do not shoot this thing down. We have said that as long as it is brought in good faith and it is not a way of gagging the Opposition, then it is a good proposal that we need to debate more about. Hon. Temporary Speaker, my other point is on parliamentary oversight. I am glad we have moved from Senate oversight. It is necessary for the Senate and National Assembly that this matter be factored in the next financial year. In the coming Budget, we need the Budget and Appropriations Committee (BAC) to appropriate some funds towards this proposal. That is how we will know this Government is serious about supporting this proposal. The BAC Chairman is not here but I hope this message will get to him and all the Committee Members. Let them appropriate these funds as we work on amending the Constitution. On the issue of the National Government Constituency Development Fund (NG-CDF), we had this debate in the First Session of this term and I wish to adopt my comments. The only thing that we need to talk about is how we distribute NG-CDF monies to constituencies. On matters of education it is a very unfair system. How do you explain to me that a child in Garissa gets Ksh50,000 worth of bursary but a child in Nairobi gets Ksh5,000? In North Rift another one gets Ksh15,000 and in Nairobi, Ksh5,000! Wajir and Mandera university students get paid for an entire year. In Nairobi, it is chaos trying to distribute these bursaries. How do you explain a scenario where you have, say, 80 or 150 students in one classroom and yet somewhere else there are 20 or 30 students in a classroom? This is something we really need to talk about. As much as we are talking about amending the Constitution, the quality of education here in the capital, where the majority of Kenyans live and where we have majority of the young population, must be considered. Finally, on the two-thirds gender rule, whichever way we argue it, can we not find a formula that is democratic? Let us not start assigning constituencies that only certain genders should vie. I feel the formula that we have been given is not very clear. Does it restrict? Does it mean that in the constituencies that have female Members no man should ever vie there? We have not thought this thing through, the issue of how we nominate Members. Let us not kid ourselves. We have seen nominations going to girlfriends and not to the deserving women. For those women who are deserving in politics, they have gone back to the constituency, vied and have been elected. We need a formula that gets the right women here on merit. It should not be based on who you know or how much money you have; rather it should be about a system that gets us the right numbers and the right people in this House. Let us not make mistakes here that we have seen being made in the county assemblies. Hon. Temporary Speaker, there are some good proposals here, whichever side of the House one comes from. We need to find the right formula on some of these issues so that we can address them, especially the issue of bringing Cabinet Secretaries in the House. Remember, we do not want to kill the committees. I think all chairpersons of committees are concerned about it. It is time the Liaison Committee sat down and addressed this issue. They have the privilege of discussing these issues so that we ensure we do not demean committees. We should make this Parliament better than the previous two. Thank you, Hon. Temporary Speaker."
}