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{
    "id": 166410,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/166410/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 201,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Musila",
    "speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister, Ministry of State for Defence",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 94,
        "legal_name": "David Musila",
        "slug": "david-musila"
    },
    "content": "Therefore, the exercise of vetting judges and magistrates should not be viewed as, in any way, victimising those loyal and dedicated judges and magistrates. It must be viewed as a necessity to weed out of the Judiciary people who have not been able to deliver as it were. These are some of the few reasons as to why our Judiciary has lost respect from members of the public. There are many other reasons as well. Corruption has been cited in the Judiciary but I do not want to dwell on that one. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, even the dedicated judges and magistrates will agree that the exercise of vetting judges and magistrates is actually in their interest – to weed out those who are unable to deliver, so that the respectability of the Judiciary may be restored. It is very necessary in order for any country to move forward; to have a reliable and respectable Judiciary. That is one of the reasons as to why I support this Bill. I also support the high standards of the membership of the Board, particularly those for the chairperson and the vice-chairperson, as provided for under Part II, Clause 8(2) of the Bill, which reads as follow:- “A person shall not be qualified for appointment as the chairperson or deputy chairperson unless such person has at least twenty years’ or an aggregate of twenty years’ experience as a judge of a superior court, a distinguished legal academic, a judicial officer or other relevant legal practice in the public or the private sector in Kenya.” I think that those are very high standards that we are setting for the chair and the vice-chair of this Board. As previous speakers have said, it is very necessary to ensure that people who are going to serve in this board are going to be people of integrity, who are going to practise a lot of fairness in whatever they are going to do, because there should be no victimization at all in this exercise. Clause 18(2) sets out the procedure of vetting judges. We are all aware of the previous exercise that was undertaken by Justice Ringera, where there was no vetting procedure but simple witch-hunt. The exercise ended up victimising good judges and leaving out judges whose conduct was questionable. Therefore, we went through the experience of the so-called radical surgery. It was unfair, and even today we have judges and magistrates who are suffering at home because they were condemned unfairly by that exercise. Therefore, any procedure of vetting of magistrates and judges must be above board, and must be seen to be fair and no amount of witch-hunt should be seen in it."
}