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{
    "id": 1451862,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1451862/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 115,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Kikuyu, UDA",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Kimani Ichung’wah",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": " He has put it in layman’s terms, that, indeed, what we are conducting is the requiem mass. After the mass this afternoon, the final internment will be in the State House and the Speaker will convey a Message to His Excellency the President that the House has agreed with him. But I also heard what Hon. Caroli Omondi said. Probably, if we were under ordinary circumstances, there are certain things, like the tax amnesty that was being granted to Kenyans that may be Hon. Caroli Omondi or any other Member of this House would have sought to save from this Bill, then the Speaker would have had something to present to the President negating his reservation. What has happened with the death of this Finance Bill, Kenyans who were going to enjoy tax amnesty for the next one year will not enjoy it. Our small-scale farmers and business people who were going to enjoy exemption from Electronic Tax Invoice Management System (eTIMS) have lost that opportunity with the death of this Bill. There are some lessons we can learn, as a country, when we consider Bills in this House. Questions that were asked to you, Hon. Speaker, by the Member for Keiyo South Constituency, the Member for Suba South Constituency and the issue that was raised by the Senior Counsel, Hon. Otiende Amollo, are critical in informing Kenyans. You remember on the X Space when the President declined to assent to this Bill, Kenyans were being told to forget about what was being done and the Bill would still become law at the lapse of 14 days. It is good for Kenyans – and I am saying this to thank you, Hon. Speaker, for indulging those questions and even the issues raised by Hon. Otiende Amollo through Hon. Millie - to be informed that a Bill can never become a law or an Act of Parliament unless and until it is assented to by the President or at the laps of 14 days if the President does not assent to it or does not do anything. If this Bill was sent to the President and he stayed with it beyond 14 days from the time it was presented to him, then it would have become law. These are some of the untruths and falsehoods that were being peddled out there. As we said during the Kamukunji, in a way, just like the President conceded that his Government had failed Kenyans in communication, even ourselves as a House, and I said this in our leadership meeting, we have also failed in communicating and letting Kenyans know what goes on in this House. I remember many Kenyans at the end of the Second Reading believed that that was faitaccompli and the Bill had come to an end. That is why even on the 25th June 2024, many Kenyans did not understand that even part of the amendments that were being done were helpful. It is a lesson for us following the death and eventual interment of this Bill, as a House, probably to bring back the parliamentary open days. Let us bring our young men and women in the country and to sit in this House in the Public Gallery so that they can get to understand the actual process of law- making, namely, when a law becomes a law and when things can be changed and when you cannot. It is my submission that we have, indeed, as a House failed, to a large extent, in not allowing or letting Kenyans understand the law-making process and what goes on in this House. We have assumed that everybody understands what goes on in this House."
}