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"id": 446794,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/446794/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Hon. Chepkong’a",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 1154,
"legal_name": "Samuel Kiprono Chepkonga",
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"content": "we concluded and the agreed issues are annexed. Herewith is the agreed version of the County Governments (Amendment) Bill, 2014. To put this Bill into perspective, the County Governments Act of 2012 in section 9 obligates the governor and I wish to read it for purposes of clarity, “The county government shall facilitate the establishment of structures for citizens’ participation including---” I will ignore the rest and only go to that which is relevant to this particular debate and it is (f). It says: “The county government shall create avenues for the participation of people’s representatives including but not limited to members of the National Assembly and the Senate.” As you know, the governors – I do not know about other counties but for mine, he has completely ignored all elected Members of Parliament and the Senate. He has ignored this particular section. He has never called any meeting in which we have participated. We are regarded as bystanders when it comes to matters that touch on our counties in which our constituencies are based. This law is very clear. You do not require any legal interpretation in this one. I am a lawyer but in this one you do not require a lawyer. This is a layman’s drafting and it clearly states that the governor shall provide avenues for the participation of the people’s representatives including but not limited to Members of the National Assembly and the Senate. It speaks for itself; that Members of the National Assembly came first before the Senate. That is the order of business and it should continue in that manner. So pursuant to the ignorance or county governments’ deliberate attempt to sideline the elected Members of Parliament and the Senate--- One Member of the Senate decided to come up with a Bill to fill this gap that exited. He, therefore, came up with an amendment Bill, 2013 to the County Governments Act of 2012. When we sat, we found that some of those clauses that were contained in the amendment Bill of 2013 were not totally relevant to the elected Members of Parliament. We thought those were issues that should be dealt with at the county level. So, after lengthy discussions, we deleted a number of those clauses that we thought were not relevant and retained only those that we thought are important and will help in actualizing this particular sub-section of the law. Therefore, what is proposed as a compromise between the Senate and the National Assembly is as follows:- That clause 91 be amended by introducing 91(a) which establishes a county board to be known as County Development Board consisting of the following persons:- The Member of the Senate for the county elected under Article 98(1)(a) of the Constitution who shall be the chairperson of the board and convener of the board’s meeting. It is not that we wanted to elevate the position of Senate at the county level, but as you know the Constitution states that the Senate is charged with the responsibility of protecting county governments. Secondly, we also realize that Senators do not have much work like the National Assembly, and we thought that this would be something that would be important to them so that we also find relevance in terms of development in this country. Therefore, we agreed that Senators be accorded the opportunity to chair and convene meetings of all elected Members of Parliament. Members of the National Assembly, under Article 97(1)(a) of the Constitution represent constituencies located within counties. We were concerned about having a board that is lean and effective. So, we agreed that enlarging it and bringing in too many 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."
}