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"content": "role by protecting it from depletion by the Executive through the appointment of an excessive number of Ministers. The Executive has been appointing majority of the Members to the Cabinet because it needed some powers. The way it has been put in this Bill, and there is no provision for assistants here, we shall be having only 24 Ministers against what we shall be having; over 250 hon. Members in the next Parliament. In the circumstances, I foresee a situation where the Executive will be so much besieged that even the running of this country will come to a standstill. Just look at a scenario where maybe hon. Members or the National Assembly disagree with the President and he has only a battalion of 24 Ministers - I do not know how Mr. Ethuro will address that situation because he has not provided for Assistant Ministers â whom he should count on to support him in this Parliament. Will any Government business pass here? I foresee a situation where we shall be having a President who is all the time besieged. He will be having sleepless nights. I cannot agree with this Bill if our Constitution is amended to provide for might be a Parliamentary system kind of Government and a devolved system of Government. So, it is my feeling that we need a lot of consultation over this Bill to ensure that we have a smooth running of this Government. I do not have any doubt about the responsibilities or the qualifications of being a Minister. The issue of being a Member of Parliament is quite reasonable but outside there, you will find that the civil society are also fighting very hard that we delink Members of Parliament from being Ministers. This might carry the day when we review our Constitution. So what happens now if the President appends his signature on this Bill and it becomes law and we undertake constitutional review and later on the public and members of the civil society say that members of the Cabinet or Ministers should be sourced from outside Parliament; they should be professionals? So, I see that we shall be trying to pursue something that will be defeated. If you look at the scenario of the current Cabinet or before even we come to this current, the previous one; the former President could not downsize his Cabinet even to the level of 32 Members of the Cabinet. Why was it so? It is because of the political design at that time. The political scenario and landscape, in total, cannot allow unless we have a very good new Constitution I foresee that Mr. Ethuro is trying to set this country on fire because we shall be having a President and Ministers who will not be able to govern this country as members of the public would like it governed or the President himself would like it governed. So, when he says, again, that this should be implemented in the next Government, what are his intentions? If he is brave enough and if this Parliament is brave enough, let us implement this thing in this Parliament. Let us not postpone a problem where we shall not be. So, let us legislate so that if the current Parliament agrees â I know the public wants the number of Ministers downsized â why should we, as hon. Members of the current Parliament pass a law that will only be implemented in the next Government when we might not be there? Let us make our bed and sleep on it. So, I propose that during the Committee Stage of this Bill we make certain amendments to align ourselves with what we used to have in the Bomas Draft which was rejected and in tandem with the current political scenario in our country. I do not want to support but I just wish to contribute to this Bill, with those few remarks. Thank you."
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