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"id": 191710,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/191710/?format=api",
"text_counter": 232,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Githae",
"speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister and Ministry of Local Government",
"speaker": {
"id": 159,
"legal_name": "Robinson Njeru Githae",
"slug": "robinson-githae"
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"content": "I rise to support this Bill. I support it fully because we have seen the consequences of political chaos that almost brought this country to ruin. One of the functions of that Commission is to assist the Government to eliminate all forms of discrimination, ethnic relations that bring bad blood between the various tribes, and tribalism. First of all, we must all confess that we have been tribalists in this country. Why am I saying that? If you look at our personal staff--- Let me start from there because we must, first of all, look at our own selves. Look at our secretaries. Do they come from your ethnic community? Does your driver come from your ethnic community? Does your maid come from your ethnic community? Does your cook come from your ethnic community? If what I have said is correct, then you are a tribalist. We are all tribalists! We must all accept that and then ask ourselves: How do we eliminate tribalism? One of the functions of that Commission is to assist the Government to eliminate discrimination. For us to do that, we must ban certain terminologies like ancestral land. How far do we go when someone says that somebody else should go back to his or her ancestral land? We must ban that term in this country, if we are going to maintain good relations among various ethnic groups. Calling a Kenyan a foreigner; how can you be a foreigner in your own land? It is not possible! We must ban that word as long as it relates to Kenyans. Alien! How can you be an alien in your own land? You cannot! The Commission must ban the usage of such words. There are others which have come up! Settlers. How can you call somebody a settler in his or her own country? Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, the Commission must come out clearly and ban some of these terminologies, if we are going to have good ethnic relations in this country. We must also ban generalisations like: \"This community is lazy. This community has jiggers! This community has brown teeth! People in this community are all short. This community is sexy. The whole of these community members are arrogant! They are best cooks and watchmen.\" We must ban those generalisations. That is what causes ethnic hatred. The Commission must be forthright that anybody who generalises another community in those terms must be taken to account. Let me now come to hate speech and Short Text Messages (SMSs) that were very well used 1508 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES July 1, 2008 during the campaigns. The Commission must come out very clearly in banning hate speeches and jokes. Some jokes do not encourage ethnic relationships. Whereas we must ban hate speech, those who are advocating for the banning of vernacular radio stations, I think, do not know what they are talking about. A vernacular language in itself cannot incite or cause hatred among ethnic communities. Vernacular language, as popularised by Frequency Modulation (FM) radio stations cannot, in themselves--- It is the speaker! It is that person who is issuing that hate speech who should be taken action against, and not the radio station. The radio station is innocent! It is just a machine. It is the person. If you go to Russia, their vernacular radio station they use the Russian language. So, will the Russians also ban their radio station? If you go to Spain, the vernacular radio station will transmit in Spanish? So, can we then ban Spanish radio? The languages of our various communities are rich. We must encourage them! If you look at our mothers and fathers, if we say that they must listen to the radio in English and Kiswahili--- Most of them do not know those languages. So, we must, right from the outset, say that vernacular radio stations, in themselves, do not cause hate speech. It is the people; that person who is making that announcement and the interviewer who make those hate speeches. It is not the radio stations. In fact, we should encourage more. I look forward to the day when we will have vernacular television stations. We must encourage our languages. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, the Bill will also encourage cultural and religious respect. That is correct. That will encourage peaceful co-existence. But I have got some various comments and, fortunately, the Minister for Justice, National Cohesion and Constitutional Affairs has requested us to enrich this Bill. In Section 4(1) the Bill says that the headquarters of the Commission shall be in Nairobi. Why Nairobi? In fact, it should establish branches in all the provinces and districts. That is where the people are. If it stays in Nairobi, it may just serve the town dwellers. So, I would like to see a provision where it is not mandated that it must be in Nairobi. It can be anywhere in the Republic of Kenya. Again, under Section 4(2), the Commission may hold its sittings in any place in Kenya. I think it must be mandated that it must hold meetings, not \"may\", in, at least, all the towns in the Republic of Kenya. That will make the Commission more effective. The other clause that I have a problem with is Section 5(1)(c). It says that the Commission shall consist of--- It says the Chairperson of the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR). My experience has been that when you mandate the actual person and not the representative, you are bound to lack quorum. So, I think we should also add a clause that says: The Chairperson or his or her representative. That way, the Commission will not lack quorum. We should also do the same for the Chairpersons of the National Commission on Gender and Public Complaints Standing Committee. Otherwise, this Commission may lack quorum. I have seen this happen previously, where the Treasury used to see the Permanent Secretary, but was not able to see the Attorney-General and the Attorney-General or the Minister was not able to attend in person. Therefore, where there was no provision for a representative of either Minister or the Attorney-General in the boards of corporations, most of the times, there was no quorum. So, in order to avoid the issue of lack of quorum, let us also have also their representatives. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, Clause 5(3) says: The Commissioners shall, at their first meeting, elect a vice-chairman from amongst the commissioners appointed under subsection (2)(b). I would prefer a clause which says that if the chairperson is a man, then the vice- chairperson must be a woman, or the other way round. This will show that when we talk about gender, we actually mean it. We do not just talk about gender for the sake of it. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, Clause 6(2) spells out reasons for disqualifying a person from being appointed as a commissioner. Clause 6(2)(d) says: July 1, 2008 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 1509 \"has promoted sectoral, ethnic, racial or religious animosity or openly advocated for partisan ethnic positions or interests.\" Such a person should not be a member of the Commission. In fact, my view is that it is actually that person who needs to be a member of the Commission, so that he can change. There is nothing good like a person who is talking from experience. So, the fact that somebody once promoted negative attributes and, subsequently, changed to campaign for good ethnic relations, should not be appointed a commissioner just because of that change. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, Clause 7 seeks to fix the term of the Commission at three years. This is a very short period. By the time the Commissioners have known what they are doing, one year is over. They will start working in the second year. By the time the third year has come, they have started campaigning for re-election. So, the Commission will not be effective. I would prefer that the Commissioner be appointed for a term of five years. Even better, they could be appointed for term of seven years, non-renewable, so that there will be corporate history and continuity in their working. Three years is a very short period. My main problem is on Clause 11(2). It says:- \"A person who wishes to have a commissioner removed from office may apply for removal of the commissioner to the President through the Minister, and such application shall be copied to the Chairperson.\" Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, we have a lot of busybodies in this country, particularly from the civil society. If you provide that any person who wishes to have a commissioner removed from office may apply for the removal of the commissioner to the President---"
}