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"speaker_name": "Mr. Poghisio",
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"legal_name": "Samuel Losuron Poghisio",
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"content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I want to focus on four or five issues. We need a different group of people who are committed to forming political parties to stand by this Bill, when it is passed. I am not sure whether we qualify for that. I do not think so. This is the only House where you find the Leader of Government Business on that end, being named as a leader of another party. The Leader of Official Opposition is scampering to become a presidential candidate in a different party. That is all here in this House. We do not need to go very far to say that we need to reform our manners. We need to agree that we will change based on the rules that we make in this House. Right now, no hon. Member should be attacking another. No hon. Member should be saying: \"That side is wrong to poach!\" We should now come out of that because everything is free for all at the moment! The referee has taken a break. Everybody is actually kicking the ball in any direction they want. I do not think it is right for us, at this point, to think that any hon. Member is morally above the other. We need to come out and say: \"We are determined to change from now on.\" Otherwise, we will only be enacting more Bills and not standing by the rules that we make. When it comes to qualifications, I would like to suggest that, in terms of the leadership of political parties, it is important - and I do not know why Kenyans are running away from that - to set out academic parameters as well. It is not difficult to set out academic parameters or 956 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES April 25, 2007 qualifications. Who qualifies, academically, to lead a party? We do not have to say there are university degrees that are equivalent. You can put them down as well. That forces people to strive to attain certain academic credentials in order to lead. We better not run away from that. As you know, from previous experiences, the only qualification that is required of an aspiring candidates for a parliament seats is a proficiency certificate in either English or Kiswahili. They are tested by language boards. We know that those language boards were always controlled by some people. So, we do not want those kinds of qualifications which do not help, in people striving to attain certain academic qualifications. For example, to qualify to be a Member of Parliament, what is wrong with saying one has to have a minimum of a Form Four or Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) certificate? Why can we not set parameters so that people set to equate whatever qualifications they have, so that they amount to that? That is one of the issues that I would like to be included in the Bill. The other issue which is difficult is the one pertaining to the political parties funds. That is going to be a difficult thing to manage. Just as we do not have commitment to political parties, we are not really well known for upholding fiscal discipline per se . We are not particularly famous for declaring our records and so on. This fund is going to be managed by the same Registrar who also registers people and parties. I think we are going to have a Registrar who is really more preoccupied with money than political parties. Fiscal discipline is something that we need to inculcate in this country, so that people may learn to report and keep books. That is lacking. In this Bill, we have a shortage of people who can do this kind of thing. I think we just need to commit ourselves to fiscal discipline. This fund should not be under the Registrar. It must be kept better than being under the same Registrar of Political Parties. I would like us to make it difficult for people to associate along tribal lines. I know that this Bill tries to say that. But I think we should really make it difficult for people to purely form parties out of tribal or regional alignments. This section of the Bill must be strengthened, so that somebody from Kacheliba, northern Turkana or North Horr, for example, can actually qualify to be a leader of a political party. Today, we have people from marginalised areas who are leading political parties. I want to congratulate those parties which have allowed people from far-flung areas to become their secretaries-general or interim chairmen for a week or so. That is a good sign. But I would like a situation where people from those areas can become presidential candidates in their respective political parties. As I speak now, that is not easy. In fact, the race for presidential candidature in this country is not going to allow people from small and remote places to contest, because of the way things have been running hitherto. For example, parties are saying that one must pay so much money to become a presidential candidate. One must pay a lot money, for example, Kshs2 million and so on, just to register. If I were to contest, I would need to sell very many cows, just to become a presidential candidate of a political party. We must make it difficult for people to associate along family, tribal and regional lines. One of the measures to put in place is to put quotas to the political parties; that you must be seen to have, in your membership, people from all over the country. People in leadership should be allowed to grow within the parties. That is not going to be easy. I look forward to a time when they can allow people who are now in leadership of these parties, and who merit, to be supported, so that they can actually become presidential candidates. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I have been in this Parliament for sometime now. I first came here in 1988 and I have been here up to this time. I know that I am now qualified to run for the Presidency. But there are people who are running for the Presidency even when they are not qualified. So, it is very possible that things are upside-down in this country. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I would like to comment on the issue of political party ideologies. If we can reach a point where we can know where we stand and what our manifestos April 25, 2007 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 957 are all about--- When KANU and KADU were started, they had ideologies. They even had their own alignments during the Cold War era. We should get to a point, within this Bill, where we understand the ideologies, manifestos and principles of our political parties. We should be able to know, for example, where or when one party departs from the other in terms of principles. When will we get to that point? That is what we should be dwelling on, so that I know, for example, out of principle that if I am not nominated in KANU, which is my political party to date, I am not going to move to the Democratic Party, because I know that my principle does not allow me to go there. I have to step down first, then, if I want to join the other party because of what I have seen as good, I will go through another process of being acculturated into the other party, a few years down the line. I should not be given a post in another party the same day I move from my party. I think we better come out of those kind of things. We must be able to know that I am at the centre, for example, and Mr. Muturi is on the right, while Mr. Sambu is on my left. If we can reach that point, that will reduce the number of political parties in this country, because there are not too many principles and ideologies out there. We do not have to fund 66 political parties. We have very few of them which are based on principles. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, as we look at this attempt by the Minister to organise political parties, and I thank her for that, we need to work on our own culture, character and principles. So, we may have to borrow from elsewhere. We do not have to re-invent the wheel on principles and ideologies. We may have to borrow from elsewhere. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, as I conclude, I do want to urge hon. Members that it is good to stand in their political parties. It is good to belong to a political party. I admire those people who belong to the Democratic Party and KANU and have not been moved into these bigger categories. It is good to stand by our political parties. It is good to be small, but be firm. As they say, good things come in small packages. Small is good. I would encourage those who believe that they belong in those small parties not to move around and try to belong to big political parties. FORD(K) has been able to stand as a small political party and I am glad that there are others who want to stand like that. I think that is good. The pressure of big political parties does not need to carry us very far. I am saying this because I know that there is a lot of peer pressure of politics to belong to big parties. We do not have to do that. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, as I bring this to a close, I am saying that if the Registrar of Political Parties is to be in place this year, and if this Bill is to come into effect this year, we will ask ourselves: What is going to happen to the status quo? At the back of our minds, we will also ask ourselves: What is going to happen to the arrangement as it is today? It would look more like what the Bible describes as the last days. It will be more disarray because it would mean some people will have to move from where they are. So, I am not so sure that the publishers and drafters of this Bill really did intend for it to come into effect this year because it is a Bill that can disorganise this year and all of us. Some of the things that I see in here where you have to move from where you are, things have to change and some order has to come, we have to think whether this is really what we intend to do. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, this Bill intends to re-organise. It is assuming that we have been organised but attempts to re-organise. It says: \"This will be a departure from the previous practice where political parties were registered under the Societies Act\". We are having a new registration; an independent office; which means we will not be able to influence it. I am assuming that means we will not be able to influence it from where we are but I can only assume that. However, there are many cases going on about the struggle in political parties as we know it. There are many issues that will come to light that will make this difficult to implement. So, I think as we go on discussing this Bill, we need to have a lot of consensus along 958 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES April 25, 2007 the way so that we all agree if we want this Bill to come into effect this year or it is something for prosperity. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I want to agree with the clause which talks about the people who cannot be founding members of political parties; those who are serving in the Civil Service. However, there is a category of people who are serving in the private sector known as the church. You know in a way, it is a service to the public, and you know I am actually a member of a church. That is why I agree that a Bill should be brought here to regulate those things. If, by definition, the bishop of my church is allowed to be a leader of a political party or qualifies to be one, you know that is potential for chaos in the country. So, let us not also ignore that these movements, like the church and so on, are public institutions. I think we need to realise that those are public institutions. The pastors are public servants and those followers in the mosques and churches. So, we need to also think about those. Should we really have political parties? I know that this Bill is trying to restrict the religious aspect but right now we have situations where some of the parties are simply a reaction from religious leaders. When you attempt to deregister them, it also becomes a problem. So, I think that we need also to regulate movements. I know that we do not want to be restricting people since there is freedom of religion and expression but we need to be very careful that we do not allow public institutions which are meant for the greater good of this country to also take up political work. So, I agree with the restrictions of those political parties that are registered and which will divide Kenyans. So, I am glad, and I am hoping that it will not be a bad thing to regulate; that is, not to allow churches and mosques to be used for politics but maybe that our people can unite. That is the only place where our people can unite and I am hoping that we would not have problems with religious groups thinking that we are muzzling them because their calling is to another world. It is other worldly. That is something that I need to add to this and I am glad that it has been said. I, personally, support church work and this Bill but I like it when it says, \"The Registrar of Political Parties shall, before he comes to the registration of political party, inform the political party in writing of the intention to cancel the registration and direct the political party to within 90 days remedy the breach or comply with the provisions of this Act.\" If there is any law breached, there is an allowance of 90 days in order to correct that so that there is no chaos in this country. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I just have one more issue to talk about. I want to talk about transitional provisions in Clause 37 of this Bill. I am glad that the transitional provisions are there in this Clause although they are not exhaustive. Clause 37(2) states: \"An Original Party, which does not apply for registration under sub-section (1), shall be deemed to be an unlawful political party Provided that an Original Party in respect of which-\" Those are some of the things that I like for us not to kill or destroy; what was original in this country. There are some parties in this country that we can say are the backbone of this country's political system that we may not necessarily allow for them to disappear. That brings me to this point that political parties, like my own party KANU, really should not be allowed to disappear from this country so that we do not allow for machinations that may want to remove this party from existence. I am passionate about this because I know that most of us in this House belong to that party and that all our founding fathers base their politics on the principles of this party. I am asking my colleagues on the Government side that whatever they do when they want to move on to their own other parties, they should leave the political party known as KANU alone and go on their own. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I want to thank you for that and I support."
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