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"id": 234841,
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Wetangula",
"speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs",
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"legal_name": "Moses Masika Wetangula",
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"content": " Thank you very much, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, for giving me this chance. I wish to second this Bill. If you recall, we debated this Bill quite extensively sometime back and did not pass it. The management, accommodation and protection of refugees is nothing new to Kenya. Indeed, we have hosted, perhaps, some of the largest numbers of refugees that one can talk of in this region. This has been due to the fact that our country has remained a reasonably stable island of peace with disturbed neighbourhoods. You recall that in the 1970s, we hosted many of our brothers and sisters from Uganda. They have since gone back to their country, but some chose to settle here. We also hosted refugees from Rwanda, Ethiopia, Eriteria and Sudan. We also hosted many refugees from Southern Africa such as Zimbambwe, Mozambique and South Africa. I recently met a colleague who is a Member of Parliament in Mozambique, who has very fond memories of Kenya. He lived in Kenya and married a Digo girl from the Coast. He considers Kenya his second home. To host refugees, we must be in conformity with the Geneva Convention and all the protocols signed under it. Being a refugee is a status nobody would wish to have. But being a refugee is also a status that everybody must understand. That is why this Bill seeks to lay out the rights, obligations, duties and limitations of refugees who may come to or are in this country. It takes cognisance of the fact that despite your description as a refugee notwithstanding, you are, first and foremost, a human being entitled to, among other things, treatment with dignity, observance of your human rights and due process in the event that an action is taken that may adversely affect you. All these are factors that are taken into account in this Bill. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, if you recall the difficulties we ran into when we first dealt with the Refugees Bill, there was the anxiety among our colleagues here who either come from areas or represent areas where we have had disturbances and a creation of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). Kenyans were many times angry, and rightly so, that they could see funds being expended from the UNHCR, sometimes from our Government, to cater for our brothers and sisters from foreign countries and yet we have Kenyans who have been internally displaced and made constructive refugees and yet nobody went out of their way to give them support. An IDP or an external refugee are refugees nonetheless. This Bill recognises the fact that November 14, 1006 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 3633 even IDPs must be catered for as of right. They also have rights, obligations and expectations that are legitimate and must be catered for. To do so, we need a legal framework which is being addressed by this Bill today. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, in dispensing this duty by the State, the Bill recognises the need to have a Refugee Status Determination Committee so that we do not need to have war criminals walk into this country. As a Government and as a people, we are bogged down by demands to hand over a man called Kabuga whom we do not even know or where he is, yet he is perhaps, supposed to be here under cover of a refugee. The Bill, under Clause 4, excludes criminals from coming into this country and claiming refugee status. This is very important because it is critical to control transnational crimes and prevent transnational criminals from committing atrocities in one jurisdiction and hopping across to another for safe haven. Persons who have committed crimes against peace, acts of terrorism, war crimes, crimes against humanity as defined in any international instrument to which Kenya is party, are not given the privilege of being refugees in this country. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, if you may recall, even before bringing this Bill, this Government flushed out Somali Warlords from this country. We even influenced IGAD member States to also deny them entry and freeze their assets, because they fell in the category anticipated by Clause 4 of this Bill: That is, waging war against their own state, committing crimes against peace and engaging in war criminal activities. Such people should not be given the privilege of being refugees. Indeed, such people must be taken back to where they came from to face the due process. Of course, the situation in Europe is normally different in that when you arrest such people, and in their jurisdiction there is a death penalty in their statutes, they do not take you back because the European Union does not recognise the death penalty. But here in Kenya, we still have the death penalty in our statute books. So, if we get them, we send them back irrespective of the consequences that they will face. I think this is good law because our large hearts as a people; our benevolent behaviour towards refugees and persons in distress should never compromise our attitude to people who have committed atrocities against others. That is why, as a Government, we have been committed all through to help Rwanda and other countries to track down the war criminals who perpetrated genocide. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the Bill also establishes a Department of Refugee Affairs, which was never there. Refugees have been handled on an ad hoc basis, and have been swung on a Ping-Pong between the Ministry of Home Affairs and Ministry of State Immigration and Registration of Persons. Now, we are going to have a full-fledged department under this Ministry that has brought this Bill, whose duty would be to deal with refugee issues. I just want to tell the Minister that in Clause 7, in describing the Commissioner of Refugees Affairs, he has failed to give his qualifications. We have now set a trend in this House that when we establish a statutory office, it is important that we define the qualifications of the office holder so that tomorrow we do not come back and say the Government has appointed an unqualified person because of the loophole in the law. I want to urge the Minister that when we come to the Committee Stage, he should assist the House by describing the qualifications of the person who should be appointed the Commissioner of Refugees. But the office is important because it has a duty to co-ordinate these issues. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, many times, the UNHCR has found its way to our Ministry, seeking to be assisted. But now, once we have the Commissioner of Refugees, they know where to first start from and only go to other jurisdictions at an appellate level. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, Clause 8 sets up a committee that determines the status of refugees. I also want to urge the Minister that on the number of persons listed to sit on this 3634 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES November 14, 2006 Committee, because of the critical importance of environment and environmental effects that our housing of refugees in certain places attracts, a representative of the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources should sit on this committee. I am saying this because we have heard of the cases in Dadaab and Kakuma refugee camps where we never took environmental assessment studies before we settled refugees there. I think such a representative of the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources would add value to the work of this committee. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the Bill also recognises, as I said earlier, that refugees have rights and obligations. An appeals board is set up under the Act so that those who are affected by administrative decisions of the committee can find their way to appeal. There are committees, sometimes, that flout due process. They can reject your application simply because you do not look good, or you come from a country that the chairman does not like, or something like that. Clause 9 creates an appeals board where all those aggrieved can seek redress. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, Clause 9(2)(a) says:- \"The Appeals Board shall consist of- (a) a chairperson who is an advocate of not less than ten years standing appointed by the Minister.\" In Kenya, any lawyer who has seven years standing qualifies to become a judge of the High Court. I want the Minister to peg on the qualification to become a judge of the High Court. He should reduce the requirement of service as an advocate of ten years to seven years. This is because that is the period that is determined in the appointment of a judge of the High Court. I believe we may appoint judges who have left the High Court or advocates who are fit to become judges of the High Court. This Bill also provides that in the event that such a board makes a decision whereby the refugee or the applicant is aggrieved, then he or she has access to the Hight Court. This is very important because the quasi-judicial bodies sometimes make decisions that are not legally informed. When they are not legally informed, it is important that those who are aggrieved go to the High Court. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the Bill also very elaborately defines who is supposed to be recognised as a refugee. The Bill is very detailed on this. This is very important. But more importantly, the Bill also provides for transitory grounds where persons who are applying for refugee status can be accommodated. I want us, as country which has been blessed with an environment that attracts our brothers and sisters from other countries to come in as refugees, not to take them to unpalatable camps. We need to take a cue from, for example, the United Kingdom (UK). When an individual lands there, as a refugee and he has a family, the first thing they do is to accommodate them. If he has young children and they have been going to school in their country, they make sure that opportunities are immediately availed to them to continue with their education. To be a refugee is not to curtail or put to a stop your life's progression. If your children are going to school, they have to continue doing so. When we have these transitory grounds they must take into account all the needs of the refugees. These needs include water, sanitation, health centres, schools and, above all, facilities that will cater for the delicate members of the society like women. We may have expectant women refugees or young girls who are just approaching adulthood. Facilities must be availed to make sure that these people benefit from the inventions of modernity that help people in those kinds of situations. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the Bill also recognises that if you are an alien, you come into the country and your matter goes through due process, you are still recognised as a refugee. But if eventually it is rejected, then you can be sent away. We should do not just lock the door before we hear somebody. The moment somebody knocks and comes in, we should give them status that will guarantee them peace, security and protection. More importantly, the Bill also recognises the dependants of refugees. If, for example, my good friend, Mr. Weya, fled November 14, 1006 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 3635 the country to a neighbouring country, his family can follow him. They all will be accorded a similar status. This Bill recognises that as well. We have had our brothers who have come here because they are running away from danger and they leave behind their loved ones, their children and aging parents. The Bill recognises that those people can come in and enjoy their lives with the families that have come here. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, on the broader picture on refugee law, this is something for which one lauds the late President Nyerere of Tanzania. That is lacking in this Bill and we need to find a way of putting it. In Tanzania, the law provides that someone is given the status of a refugee with the right after a certain time to apply to become a citizen of the country. Refugees have their own production line to countries. There are countries that have benefitted from immigrants. The United States of America (USA) is booming because of immigrants. Some went there as refugees, but they settled down and they have contributed immensely to the country. Sometimes, disadvantages can turn into enormous advantages. We need a clause where, under certain circumstances, persons who have lived here long enough and are not able to go back to their countries, they have studied and are professors, doctors, engineers and mechanics, we can find a way of absorbing them into Kenyan citizenry. This happens in other countries. We all know that African boundaries were crudely and arbitrarily drawn in 1886 by whites sitting in Berlin without caring whether my cousin was across the border in Uganda or not, and whether Mr. Dahir's family was in Kenya and other Somalis were in Somalia. All they wanted was to curve out spheres of influence. We are all one. If you are a refugee and you love the country that has given you sanctuary, it is desirable that we have a clause to look into this issue. Some of my colleagues may not like it, but it has happened in other countries. In Tanzania, for example, there are many people from Rwanda, Burundi, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique who settled there and have now become citizens of that country. One of them is a former colleague of ours, an hon. Member of Parliament called Gen. Ulimwengu. He is one of the major publishers of newspapers and news print in Tanzania. He came from Burundi and settled with his family in Tanzania. He is now a Tanzanian. He is very productive. We have other great people like Prof. Lule and others whom we all know. If we were to give them citizenship, we would benefit more from them than they would benefit from us. This is something that we need to legalise and put in this Bill. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, as we debate this Bill, I want to repeat what I said recently here the other day. We are having a terrible influx of refugees from Somalia. I want to reiterate and urge our colleagues, especially from the frontier with Somalia, to get involved and help us, as a Government, to bring together the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia (TFGS) and the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) to talk and realise that their country and their people are more important than their thirst for power. That is the only way that Somalia will come to normalcy. If we do that, the more than 2,500 refugees per day flocking into Kenya will be a thing of the past. I also want to salute the contribution of Somali refugees in Kenya. I was told by some statistician that, last year alone, remittances from Somalis in the diaspora to Somalis living in Kenya recorded over Kshs60 billion in foreign exchange. This is a very positive indicator to our economy. As we benefit, it should be both ways. We must provide facilities as this Bill requires. I want to urge my colleagues that this is a wonderful Bill. It is a dawn in the management of refugee issues in this country. We need to support this Bill. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, lastly, when we host refugees in this country, there are many organisations such as the World Food Programme (WFP) and other United Nations agencies that bring in a lot of money to this country. However, you will find that the WFP or the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), when they want to procure supplies for 3636 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES November 14, 2006 refugees, will buy maize from Brazil or Argentina, yet we have maize in Kitale. They will bring in soap from India and we have soap in Industrial Area. They will bring in all manner of things. We need, as a Government, to make it a policy that those who want to come and support us here in whatever manner should do their procurement locally. That is the only way we can boost our economy. We grow maize and we manufacture soap. We have everything. We should have a requirement. The Minister should tell the UNHCR and the WFP that we, as a Government, will not allow maize to come in from Brazil to be taken to Kakuma Refugee Camp to feed refugees when maize is rotting in the stores in Kitale. We will not allow soap to come from India when there is soap pilling up in godowns in Industrial Area. Those are some of the benefits that our economy must have. The procurement must not only be local, but it must also be geared towards improving the economic lives of the locals, so that when a local businessman is competing with a non-local, depending on the variables set in place, the local must be given priority. Those are some of the benefits that we need to get from being generous to our brothers and sisters from other countries. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, with those few remarks, I beg to second this Bill."
}