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"id": 1399603,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1399603/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Cheruiyot",
"speaker_title": "The Senate Majority Leader",
"speaker": {
"id": 13165,
"legal_name": "Aaron Kipkirui Cheruiyot",
"slug": "aaron-cheruiyot"
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"content": "People are not corrupt because there is a lack of good legislation or lack of enforcement. As a society, we have accepted that as a way of life. Everybody wants a shortcut, to be bribed and make a quick buck out of whatever situation; from voters to politicians, members of the private sector, and anyone. There are very few people who can stand and say 'no' and just do the right thing. We have many legislations we consider in Parliament, the reports, and the offices we created in the 2010 Constitution. They will not work until we begin to appreciate that corruption is a values problem and begin to teach it from a young age in our school systems, so that it is inbuilt in the culture of the younger generation. Unfortunately, there is little you can do with people once they have clocked the age of 18 and even sometimes less than that. If they have accepted that this is the way of life, there is very little we can do. You can only deter and that is what this legislation will do. It is the threat of going to jail and being exposed that will limit people. However, if you want to live in a country where people have discipline and obey traffic rules, then we must begin to teach this practice and culture to our children at a very young age. Unfortunately, there is very little the rest of us in this Parliament today and in this room can do. All of us who are adults already, there are very few habits that we can pick up late in life and begin to accept as a way of life. This is a fact of life As much as I agree with Sen. Crystal Asige that corruption is a values problem, which we have to deal with, then we do not have a choice. We cannot simply sit pretty and say, so long as that is how Kenyans are and that is how the world is, what do we do? Countries that have succeeded in limiting all these vices and societal ills, is on account of laws such as this, where the threat of being exposed, going to jail or losing ill- acquired wealth, makes you hold back because that is human nature. People, so long as they know that there is a risk in doing certain practices, then long after all this is said and done, at least somebody will reflect at night and think through and say, “my goodness, if I do this, what is going to happen?” Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, I hope one day we can have a conversation with the Chief Justice and the Judiciary in general. I have a strong feeling that circuit is yet to be complete. I know that previously at the Bomas of Kenya, there was a conference. If you remember the infamous conference where former President Uhuru quipped, “what do you want me to do?” That was a conference that had brought together all the instruments and state agencies that are involved in this fight against corruption. We had the office of the Director of Public Prosecution (ODPP), the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC), the Directorate of Criminal Investigation (DCI), the Judiciary and the Legislature. I am not sure if the Legislature was represented at that particular conference. We must also begin to ask very difficult questions about our Judiciary. How can they keep on coming back to us and tell us that it is on account of poor investigations and that the cases are not properly handled, that the conviction rate is so minimal? How comes it so difficult to nab these people that are engaged in these vices, yet eventually,"
}