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"id": 291345,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/291345/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Eng. Rege",
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"speaker": {
"id": 135,
"legal_name": "James Kwanya Rege",
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"content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, thank you for giving me the opportunity to contribute to the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Amendments) Bill, 2012. I want to congratulate the Minister for coming up with these amendments and especially the amendments on vandalism which is in this document. It could not have come at a better time than this because we have been trying to bring a Bill dealing with vandalism since last year. Only yesterday, it came out in the newspapers, which I believe is still going to take some time. But this is a quick fix for the Vandalism Bill. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, in the last three years, and you know because you are a Member of our Committee, we have experienced a lot of problems with vandalization of transformers, fibre optics, metal and cutting of bridges. While this Bill will quickly deter vandalism of these items, it falls short of addressing the real vandalism which we have at hand. Yesterday, I spoke with the Minister about this Bill and we agreed that it goes very quickly to start deterring the vice while our main Bill is coming up in Parliament. First, it does not recognize vandalism as an economic crime. Secondly, it prescribes a fine of not exceeding Kshs10 million. This means that a fine of Kshs1,000 can still be imposed for stealing a transformer and we know how much a transformer costs in terms of buying it and also the inconveniences. Some of these transformers supply power to our hospitals which sustain the lives of Kenyans. I am not sure whether life imprisonment sentence prescribed by the Bill will stand the test of constitutionality. I am sure that if we give a minimum sentence of say, ten years, we will be within the Constitution. The Bill also does not bring out clearly all the ingredients which make up the offence of vandalism, for example, hovering with intent to steal telecommunications or energy apparatus. Further, the Bill contains no mention of the end users of vandalism, namely; the scrap metal dealers who create demand for all these cables, wires, transformers and rail. This House will agree with me that once vandalism takes place, all the vandalized goods end up in the scrap metal market. Indeed, it is the unregulated scrap metal industry which is fueling the demand for copper wires and transformers. So, we believe that 80 per cent of this problem could be reduced if we institute proper crime intervention. In a nutshell, we need to deal with scrap metal dealers and the only way to do this is to re-introduce the provisions of the Scrap Metal Act, Cap.503, that were removed by a similar Bill. In conclusion, at the Committee Stage, on behalf of the Committee, I will be introducing amendments to this Bill to introduce stiffer penalties in both the Energy and the Communications Acts. This will introduce the offence of economic sabotage and recognize the act of vandalism. It will also introduce the new offence of stealing transformers or transformer oil which is also not captured in the present Bill. With those remarks, I support the Bill. Thank you for giving me the time."
}