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"id": 22590,
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"speaker_name": "Dr. Eseli",
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"legal_name": "David Eseli Simiyu",
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"content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, for giving me this chance to also add my voice in support of the nominees for the Board to vet Members of our Judiciary. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, it might appear that as time goes on, we are quite on the right path to reform our Judiciary, but we should take cognizance of the fact that the Judiciary is not the only cog in the justice world, for providing justice to Kenyans. As we proceed to pass these names and have our judges and magistrates vetted, we must remember that we are still faced with more work because we also need to revamp the investigation wing of our police service. We also need to empower the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) for the prosecutorial wing so that we can actually deliver justice. These people who have been nominated are highly qualified for the jobs they have been nominated for. What we do not expect them to do is to get there and set up an inquisition. It is not an inquisition we are looking for, but we want to clean up our Judiciary so that we retain the best that we have. This is because, indeed, we have very many good men and women serving in the Judiciary. We expect that if they go about their work diligently and carefully, without bringing in inquisitorial methods, we will be able come up with a proper Judiciary to run the justice system in this country. As I say that, we also need to look carefully at some issues which are in the Constitution and are proving very difficult to meet, like the issues of regional representation, ethnic balance and so forth. They do not seem to be going uniformly because as we are on the Constitutional Implementation Oversight Committee (CIOC) and people have been coming on for vetting, we have started realizing that there are some gaps along the way. Perhaps, it is because there is no standard that was set up to say that this is what we should come up with such that people are being nominated by different groups, and as they nominate them, they are not aware of who else has been nominated elsewhere so that regional balancing becomes a problem. Ethnic balancing is even more difficult. I think it is something that we need to look at carefully and, perhaps, as a Parliament, sit down and form an ad hoc Committee to look into this so that we are able to as closely as possible follow the Constitution on those issues of regional and whatever balancing. This is because it is very important. We have had some complaints already. Certain people are up in arms saying that they have been left out of the new dispensation. I think we need to look at that very carefully so that we do not continue raising the anger of certain societies within our country. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, finally, the issue of vetting judges and magistrates is very important because the common Kenyan has totally lost faith in the Judiciary as it is now, to the extent that, in the villages they prefer meeting as families, where somebody has been wronged and they decide their own compensation because they ask: “Why should we go and give our money to somebody else who will just “eat” it and not solve our problem?” This particular issue is very important and I hope that the members of the Judiciary do not feel that the country is vilifying them unfairly. It is not all of them, but a few who have tarnished the Judiciary. Therefore, these few need to be weeded out, so that the Judiciary regains its stature and the respect they deserve from the rest of Kenyans for the good work they are doing. Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir."
}