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{
    "id": 268074,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/268074/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 463,
    "type": "other",
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    "content": "constitutional criteria such as geographical features, community of interest, historical, economic, cultural ties and means of communication should have been considered so as to ensure that deserving areas get additional constituencies. Mr. Speaker, Sir, let me just mention a few issues about North Horr. This is the largest constituency in the Republic of Kenya. It has 38,953 square kilometres out of Kenya’s total of 581,770 square kilometres. That is 6.7 per cent of Kenya’s land mass. Mr. Speaker, Sir, North Horr is 505,565 times the smallest constituency in Kenya which is Mvita. Kibera is being proposed. I am told it is 2 times one and a half square kilometres. In that case, North Horr might even be more than 10 times larger than the proposed constituency called Kibera. North Horr is 86 times larger than the smallest country in Africa called Seychelles which is only about 450 square kilometres. North Horr is larger than four Kenyan provinces; the whole of Western, Nyanza, Central and Nairobi provinces by 542 square kilometres. These four provinces are represented in this Parliament by 93 MPs. That is 44 per cent of hon. Members of the Kenya National Assembly that represent those four provinces. However, only one hon. Member represents the entire North Horr Constituency which is that vast in terms of land mass. North Horr is not divided due to population quota. However, if all other constitutional criteria that the Committee argued were critical in creating those 60 wards, then for sure, North Horr would have been considered. If those criteria were also equally weighed just like population, then North Horr would have been divided. The other issue I want to address is the issue of population quota. We derive population quota in Article 89 of the Constitution from the National Census. That national census, the Government officially accepted that it was inconsistent and irregular. More than that, just the other day on the Floor of this House, the Minister for Planning, National Development and Vision 2030 did mention that that census is irregular and that they reduced it by more than 900,000 people. I want to know which population quota is being used. From which census exercise? That is the heart of the matter because both the IEBC and the Ligale Commission were basing the entire exercise on purely population quota; purely on national census. I want to know exactly which national census we are talking about because the Government has challenged and has actually officially reduced the number by more than 900,000 people. We need to have a new criteria in terms of what exactly they mean by population quota because that is how we decide the number of votes and the number of constituencies in this Republic. Unless that is addressed, even the resolution of this House will not be of much value because most likely Kenyans will go to court and make sure it is determined effectively by the court of law. We passed in this House on 31st, August, 2011, the Urban Areas and Cities Act of 2011. Effectively, both Kisumu and Mombasa became cities. This IEBC Report only subjected Nairobi to the city parameters because it was the only one which was said to have a charter. Legally, since August of last year, both Kisumu and Mombasa are cities and they must be subjected to the parameters in the Constitution of 40 per cent above the national quota and Article 89 also provides for those cities. That is the only way to be fair. Mr. Speaker, Sir, we told the IEBC not to use the new definition of cities, urban areas and structural places and stick to was in the Ligale Report. What if Ligale was"
}