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{
    "id": 331526,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/331526/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 244,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "However, what is really a challenge to the Commission is the issue of the adversely mentioned persons. In the course of receiving over 42,000 statements from Kenyans all over this country, many names have been mentioned, in the previous Governments and in this Government; people in high places have been mentioned and also sensitive matters touching on land that have created tensions in this country. Rules of natural justice require that they must be afforded an opportunity. They must be given notice of the adverse mentioning. They must be given the opportunity to come and clear their names before this Commission before actually the report is made public. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, if this report, was, perhaps, to be released without those adversely mentioned being given due notice and the opportunity to clear their names, it would do great injustice to those who have been mentioned because it will go into the record of this country. It will form part of our history right from Indepdence. It will be handed over from generation to generation. When the children of Kenya read this report and look at what happened over the last 50 years, they will know that so-and- so, this community or that official in this Government did this or that. Before that happens, the accuracy of that information must be ascertained and the opportunity for Kenyans to clear their names must also be afforded. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, in receiving the request from the Commission, we also looked at the issues of reparations. In the absence of a clear policy on how matters of reparations could be handled, and on how matters of amnesty will be handed, it will be a great injustice to Kenyans, if we were to go ahead and say whatever happens, your time has run out, you must hand in the report as it is. That possibility is not even there, because as we speak, the time for handing over this report was supposed to have been in May. The Act required the Commission to hand over the Report to the President by May. This was not done because of the incomplete state of the report. Now that time has run out, an extension is absolutely necessary to, first of all, regularise what has happened and secondly to allow for the handing over this Report to the President. The law requires that immediately this report is handed over to the President, it must simultaneously be published for Kenyans to know exactly what happened. This is where the challenge lies. We are saying that because of the importance of this report and magnitude of the mandate given to this Commission more time is required for them to effectively discharge their mandate. The report that we expect from the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission (TJRC) will provide a road map that we are all expecting as a country. When this report is finally presented to the President and to Kenyans, it will have a roadmap through which we can have reconciliation in this country, we can have justice done to the victims. This is a Commission of a different kind from all those others that had been formed. That of the South Africa was only about the truth and reconciliation. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, our commission has an extra mandate to deal with the question of justice. Talking of justice to thousands of Kenyans over 45 years and doing it within a limited period of two years, perhaps we underestimated the period and the magnitude of the mandate that we had given them. For this reason, we are asking that we be allowed to extend this period as prayed. This would only require the amendment of Section 20 which will allow for completion of the report and afford adversely mentioned persons the opportunity to reply to the allegations. It would afford individuals the opportunity to apply for amnesty and process"
}