Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 425090,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/425090/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 274,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. (Ms.) Ghati",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 856,
        "legal_name": "Dennitah Ghati",
        "slug": "dennitah-ghati"
    },
    "content": "Hon. Deputy Speaker, I rise to support this Bill. I want to declare today that I am also one of the Members who will soon be tying the knot. Since I will be tying the knot, this Bill has come at the right time. It is giving me and many other people in this country, and especially our children and our children’s children an opportunity to decide the destiny of their unions. This Bill recognizes the various forms of marriages. It gives us the option to make choices. We know that definitely choices have consequences. This Bill recognizes Christian marriages. It is clear that within the Christian union we are getting into strictly monogamous unions. It also recognizes customary unions which have the potential rights to polygamous unions. To me, this Bill is in good taste. It is a Bill that is seeking to protect marriages. It gives us options and choices. I look at this Bill as an opportunity for so many young people in this country who get into unions of comfort; what we call “come-we-stay” marriages or cohabitation. If this Bill can actually recognize such unions--- If you look at the cost of living in this country, it is too high. Young people, even those in the universities can decide to stay together if they believe they love each other. Those unions usually, I was in university, end up in marriages. So, this Bill is giving us easy options where we do not have to go through a lot of problems trying to look for dowry and all those things. This Bill for me is very timely. We have very few lawyers who practise family law in this country. I look at it as an opportunity where our children’s children are going to find it very easy to get into unions called marriages. This is a Bill that is saving our children. It is a Bill that has the interest of our children’s children at heart. We have been having marriages since time immemorial. These marriages have for a long time been based on the British way of marriage. We have been using the 1902 Marriage Act of the Britons. We have been saying, “I do” which is the British way of doing things. We are dynamic. Marriages are dynamic and this country is dynamic too. For us to have a Bill that has been revised by Kenyans gives us autonomy to define our own destiny. For the young people who want to get married, they should know what they are saying “I do” to. Very many people go to churches to say, “I do”, but they do not know that they are saying, “I do” to the ideologies of the Britons, that is, the Marriage Act of 1902 that we have been using in this country. This Bill presents us with an opportunity for us to understand what we are saying, “I do” to. With those few remarks, I wish to support this Bill."
}