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"speaker_name": "Mr. Ethuro",
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"content": "Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I wish to take this opportunity to thank Members of the House, across the political divide for their overwhelming support for this Motion. I want to start by agreeing that, first and foremost, this Motion, in my view, will not be applicable in the current arrangement. So, Members seated before me can stop panicking and be May 14, 2008 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 1021 reassured of their jobs in the mean time, at least, for the life of the Grand Coalition Government. I also want to say that we are actually fulfilling our obligation under the Constitution. You will appreciate that lawyers being what they are, a number of them have spoken and three have contradicted each other. In fact, I want to thank the Seconder, the Member for Kisumu Town West and the Member for Mandera Central and the Assistant Minister for reading the relevant Sections of the Constitution, Section 16, which I quoted. They went ahead to read Sections 23 and 24. We do not need to amend the Constitution as many speakers have suggested. What the Constitution says is: Provided the Parliament has made a law, then, it will go by that law. If Parliament does not make a law, then we will follow the precedence. I want to agree with the Assistant Minister completely that the current Cabinet is very constitutional and legal. There is nothing illegal about the Cabinet. I think the grand idea of the Grand Opposition has taken the better part of the Seconder, but he misapplied it to this occasion. He would have an opportunity to apply it properly. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, what Members have said and I totally agree that this mismatch where a general is a deputy to a Provincial Commissioner (PC) and a PC is a deputy to a District Commissioner (DC) should not be entertained. Every party when campaigning talked of forming not more than 25 members of the Cabinet. We want to protect ourselves. The beauty about having laws is that we can protect ourselves from ourselves. When these parties sell their manifestos to Kenyans, they vote for them on the basis of a particular number of the Cabinet. But once they come to power, they forget all the promises they had made to Kenyans. We want to live up to the manifestos that we sold to Kenyans on the basis of which they elected us. We told them that we will have a lean Cabinet and we should subscribe by it. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, you will appreciate that the more younger and youthful you are, the more vigour you have in contributing and agreeing with us. I think Kenyans have taken note and definitely this Parliament has taken note of this fact. The older Ministers did not contribute to this Motion. I think that says something. It says that the future is for the youth and not oldies. They need to pack and go home. The Assistant Minister has said that we should wait for the constitutional review. My experience in this House, which I have invoked now, when you are on that side, I want to tell the fresh Assistant Minister, he is lucky to start from there, you get blinded. You do not see these things. You only see these things when you cross. You know, you need your Damascus! It is not that you do not see them. You may seem them but you cannot a bring a Motion like this one. So, that is what is constraining us. It is not that we are not even seeing. We felt it was good. I would really want agree that there is something wrong about the Kenyan politician. The moment he is out there looking for votes, he believes in opposition. But the moment he goes into Cabinet, like now our Prime Minister, he cannot even contemplate an opposition leave alone a Grand Opposition! I mean it is inconsistent that we if we believed in something, we should live through it. There is nothing wrong being on this side or the other side. We affirm that each one of us needs to play his or her respective role at any particular time. Parliament has not failed to bring this Motion. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I want to inform the House that in the Ninth Parliament, hon. J.B. Muturi gave a notice of this Motion, but it did not reach this stage because of the mood and frustrations. Even before hon. Muturi, hon. Muite had brought a similar Motion but it did not come to fruition. I think we want to thank this Parliament. I thought the Assistant Minister was going to offer, that we would go into joint partnership with him to come up with the Bill. There is no mischief in this Motion. We are not interested in power games. I know the minorities in this country suffer when big tribes always meet."
}