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{
    "id": 1422311,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1422311/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 484,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Cheruiyot",
    "speaker_title": "The Senate Majority Leader",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13165,
        "legal_name": "Aaron Kipkirui Cheruiyot",
        "slug": "aaron-cheruiyot"
    },
    "content": "It is good that as I say this, I can see the chairperson of the Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs is in the House with us this evening. Section 13 speaks on something that we have since seen, a practice that is properly evolving. We have had this challenge of a Member saying: “After my Bill was moved it went and gathered dust in the other House.” It speaks to the issue of the adoption of Bills where when you sponsor a Bill, you have to look for a co-sponsor in the other House; a practice that has already been established. However, part of the reason we are doing this law is so that we put what is in practice to be in law because we do not want to rely on just a gentlemen's understanding. Part 4 of the Bill is just about the procedure, which is the conduct of joint proceedings and committees, that if you pass an ordinary Bill and there is one reason or the other, there is need to consider it jointly, between the Houses and how to resolve that particular committee. That is simply procedure, but we may seek further ways of advancing it better. That is basically what this Bill is about. It is fairly straightforward, but as I have mentioned this particular Bill and as I move it, I am fully aware that this is the National Assembly's version of how to run a bicameral relationship. A lot of the work has to be done by our Members of the Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs Committee. Allow me to repeat for emphasis’s sake, so that we do justice to ourselves as a House, pay keen attention and give yourselves sufficient time, much as there is urgency in concluding this Bill. We have been granted 90 days by the Supreme Court to try and hammer an agreement of some sort, but more than half of that period has lapsed. I am not very certain about the number of days left. However, its urgency does not mean you compromise the standing of the Senate. I expect that our Members of the Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs will bring us consequential amendments, our view and capture it in law. However, there were those who held the view that: “No, no, that is a flawed Bill; you should not even move it, Senate Majority Leader.” However, I have explained time and again that there is nothing in a Bill that you cannot change. It is only those who do not understand legislative procedures who make such vain arguments. You can change everything in a Bill including even the title if you do not like what it is called and it is allowed. We have voted here many times. It is only that maybe sometimes people do not follow and say that the title of the Bill be changed to this. I have seen that happen. I expect serious changes to this Bill from the JLAC, so that immediately after that we can reconvene and reach a middle ground, but then we will have succeeded in doing something for posterity, so that this business of very good legislation, well thought-out, being struck down by the courts on very simple arguments, such as the fact that it was not properly considered by this or the other House, becomes a thing of the past. With those very many remarks, I beg to move and request the Senator for Tana River, Sen. Danson Buya Mungatana, to second. I thank you."
}