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{
    "id": 123374,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/123374/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 179,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "(e) The Bill establishing a special tribunal shall ensure that the special tribunal is insulated against objections on constitutionality and to that end it shall be anchored in the Constitution.” Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, the above recommendations, among others contained in the Waki Report, led to the introduction before this House of the first attempt to create a special tribunal for Kenya. The attempt failed when this House rejected it for reasons among others, are:- (i) It did not meet constitutional safeguards on the criteria and conditions set by the Waki Report. (ii )As drafted, it could not win the confidence of victims because of lack of credible, impartial, independent investigations and prosecution procedures (iii) It did not guarantee standards of trials set out in the Rome Statute. (iv) It did not have financial and political independence. (v) Provisions on witness and victim protections were inadequate. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, despite advice in a Speaker’s Kamukunji that we held in the Old Chambers attended by both the President and the Prime Minister, the efforts of the then Minister for Justice, National Cohesion and Constitutional Affairs, failed to yield. Subsequent events led to the resignation of the Minister from the Government and she was succeeded by Mr. M. Kilonzo, whose efforts also failed when his colleagues in the Cabinet rejected a much improved version of the original Bill. It was at that stage that the civil society, led by the Law Society of Kenya (LSK) and supported by others including the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), International Centre for Policy and Conflict (ICPC), FIDA Kenya and a number of us in the back- bench met, fine-tuned and improved on the earlier Bill rejected by the Cabinet and in a departure from the traditions of this august House, published it in a draft form in a website called “endimpunityinkenya.org” seeking views from Kenyans within and without. Within days, the website recorded more than 50,000 hits and close to 5,000 comments and suggestions for improvement. The result is the Bill that I am introducing to this House today."
}