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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Mungatana",
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"id": 185,
"legal_name": "Danson Buya Mungatana",
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"content": "Thank you very much, Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir. I have a few issues regarding the President’s Speech to the Nation and to this House. First of all, I would like to say that I agree that many issues were debated here and brought to the fore. However, the first thing is that while the President spoke very well on the efforts to devolve this nation, it is a contradiction that the same President decided to veto the County Governments Bill when there were other options. He could have signed it and we could have looked at any amendments that could have been brought after six months. The County Governments Bill is the one that sets out the structures under which the county governments shall operate. Whatever else we say, if this law is not in place, it means that everything he spoke about the county governments stands negated by his own veto of the law that we passed here. The Bill went through the First Reading, Second Reading and Third Reading. The second thing is that the President spoke about supporting the Independent Electoral Boundaries Commission (IEBC) now that we are going into a general election. He pledged that there will be massive civic education in terms of voter education because of the new Constitution and all the things that must be handled under the new Constitution. But it is the same President’s Minister for Finance who came here, moved a Supplementary Motion and removed Kshs4 billion from the IEBC. I spoke here and said that there is need for us to balance what we say and what we do. It is wrong and the President stands accused, through his Minister, to say that we will have massive civic education for voters when they are denying the IEBC funds to do that through a Supplementary Motion. I wonder whether the Minister for Finance was there when this passage was being written in the President’s Speech. This is obviously wrong and misplaced in view of the Supplementary Estimates which were brought to this House. The third thing is that the President spoke very clearly here and said that political parties should have a national outlook. He encouraged nationalism, patriotism among other things. However, we never heard the voice of the President coming out clearly to say that the GEMA and KAMATUSA meetings and any other tribal association where politics is the centre of those meetings should be stopped."
}