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"speaker_name": "Dr. Khalwale",
"speaker_title": "The Member for Ikolomani",
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"content": " Mr. Speaker, Sir, thank you for giving me this opportunity to talk on this first day. May I congratulate you upon your election as the Speaker of the Tenth Parliament. I would also like to congratulate hon. Members for winning in the 2007 General Elections. I would also like to congratulate the President for winning and steering the country during the just ended crisis. I would also like to congratulate Mr. Raila for appending his signature to what has become the reason why we are slowly finding order in our country. Mr. Speaker, Sir, allow me to condole members of the families that lost their loved ones during the crisis that we have been going through. May I also condole people who lost their property, including their houses. I would like to thank the people of Ikolomani for re-electing me as their Member of Parliament for a second term. I would like to thank them for, particularly, keeping peace during the crisis that we had. My constituency is the only one where people from non-Luhya communities continued and still continue to do business because our people did not rise against the so-called \"foreigners\". How I wish we had not had this problem because the Government has started off very well in Kakamega. It has given the people of Ikolomani a new district - Kakamega South District. We are very happy and we want to thank the Government. It has also given us a new division and the DC and the new DO have arrived. Mr. Speaker, Sir, having said those good words about what has been going on, allow me to come alive to the fact that the theme of the moment in this country is a Coalition Government. As we all seem to be in agreement that this is a good thing, let us not forget that we have serious national challenges that are facing this coalition. Unless we rise and address ourselves to those challenges, we could lose where we may have gained. I have in mind the issue of political institutions in this country. We must think about the Opposition in this country before we start debating the National Accord and Reconciliation Bill and the Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill. The stability of Parliament goes beyond the interest of Kenya. It places Kenya in the international community. When they do credit rating, for example, they use the stability of institutions to decide whether we can access credit or not. Therefore, we may want to think and ask ourselves: Is there anything wrong in us having a Coalition Government and, at the same time, having a Coalition of the Opposition? That is because, believe me or not, the disquiet that we are having as we move into the Coalition Government is not happening for the first time in this country. Even when KADU joined KANU to form a one-party state in this country, both sides of the House agreed. They even celebrated but, little did they know that many years later, lives would be lost, limbs broken and properties destroyed so as to restore multiparty democracy. Hon. Members, we must think about that because today, the urge to have peace might be such that we might forget that, maybe, the thirst for power could have been the reason why things went out of control. A great thinker, who did not come from Africa, Mark Victor Hansen, said that 98 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES March 12, 2008 most people think that what they want in life is power when really, what they need in life is a heart- centred visionary leadership. Wewant to use this opportunity to re-define the role of leadership. It is a shame that in all the Parliaments that we have had in this country, the real big boys who perpetrate corruption happen to come from Parliament. The challenge now to this House, now that we have agreed on a Government of National Coalition, is for us to rise and call upon the people who perpetrated Goldenberg and Anglo-Leasing to answer for it. That way, the youth will realise that the properties they wrongfully got will finally go back to them."
}