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{
    "id": 1426694,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1426694/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 396,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Okiya Omtatah",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "The idea that you have a Chief Returning officer for the Presidential Election is anathema to the provisions of Article 138 (2) and Article 89 of the Constitution. I hope that we shall have fidelity to Chapter 7 of the Constitution and begin implementing elections as prescribed in the chapter. I have seen people and even the judges of the Supreme Court trying to say that the timeline given to settle presidential election disputes is very short. Where, under Article 140 of the Constitution, a petition is given 7 days and the court is given 14 days. The problem is that they are stuck in brick and mortar, they are thinking of manual elections. If you are doing digital elections, 14 days is just too long. I would also like to point out that in Raila One - the first petition that Raila filed - a question came up on whether spoiled ballots count or not. Show me where we have spoilt ballots in the Constitution. You only have spoilt ballots when you have a manual election. Since the Constitution anticipated a fully digitized election, there should not be spoilt ballots anywhere. Spoilt ballots are a creation of the Supreme Court. That is how courts have been mutilating the Constitution through interpretations not anchored in law or fact. People are talking about two-thirds gender rule. I have read the Constitution of Kenya over and over, but I have never come across an expression “two-thirds gender rule”. We have two-thirds gender principle in Articles 27(8) and 81 of the Constitution. Again, it is the Supreme Court that invented the words, “gender rule” in the advisory that the Attorney-General sought on whether what he referred to as gender rule would apply in 2013 or later. There is nothing like gender rule. A rule must be observed. What is in the Constitution is gender principle; something that we must work towards. There is no obligation that we must implement a principle in this time and space. My friends asked me to make my submissions short. The Senator for Kiambu would also like to contribute to the Bill. I will be magnanimous and stop my submissions, though I had a long list of issues to address."
}