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{
    "id": 403531,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/403531/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 318,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. (Ms.) Ghati",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 856,
        "legal_name": "Dennitah Ghati",
        "slug": "dennitah-ghati"
    },
    "content": "Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the only thing I would suggest, the role of a journalist does not come out clearly in this Bill. We have so many journalists in this country who are not well trained. What we need to include here is regulating the various training institutions that train journalists. We have so many bogus colleges in this country that purport to train journalists and then you find bogus journalists who are exhorting money here and there from every member. Those are the things that we need to regulate. We need to have benchmarks. What does a journalist really mean? We need to ensure that a journalist has a minimum training of a given qualification so that it is clear that this is a real journalist. These are people who have been trained to serve in the media. Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I know that this is the Second Reading, there is a Third Reading. We need a lot of panel beating of this Bill so that when it comes to the Third Reading, we are all unanimous that we need to make sure that the media in this country is independent. I know very well that we are a democratic society; we have moved forward as a country, we have come a long way with the media freedom in this country. Therefore, I am very sure that once we panel beat and make sure that this Bill becomes clean, everyone is going to support it. But in its current form, I beg, to oppose, especially the hand of the Government in the Bill. I have seen the hand of the Cabinet Secretary for Information, Communication and Technology in this Bill. Let us be honest. If we want to give media freedom or if we want to guarantee media freedom, we need to remove the hand of the Cabinet Secretary in appointing or dismissing members of the Media Council. Therefore, I want to urge and ask that we do more engagements; there is the Media Council of Kenya, the Kenya Union of Journalists (KUJ) and so on. All these are included in the Media Council. We need The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}