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{
    "id": 48595,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/48595/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 447,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Githae",
    "speaker_title": "The Minister for Nairobi Metropolitan Development",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 159,
        "legal_name": "Robinson Njeru Githae",
        "slug": "robinson-githae"
    },
    "content": "Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, I was just saying that, really, what I am saying has not been repeated by anybody. As I said, I will not go into the details of the specific clauses of the Bill, because the contents of this Bill have been ventilated on by other hon. Members. I was requesting the new body we are going to form not to make the same mistakes that the Ligale Commission made. If they do so, their report will end up in controversy. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, according to the Ministry of State for Planning, National Development and Vision 2030, we have three cities, namely; Nairobi, Mombasa and Kisumu. It was wrong and discriminatory for the Ligale Commission to deem that Nairobi City is the only city in this country. It is wrong. The residents of Kisumu and Mombasa were offended when the Ligale Commission said that these are not cities. We know that they are cities. We celebrated them and even songs were made commemorating the attainment of the cities. The effect of that was that the Nairobi County was discriminating against in the allocation of new constituencies. So, whoever will be the Chairman of the body we are creating, please, do not make that mistake. There are three cities and they should be treated equally. You should not try to give one, two or more of the cities some preferential treatment. The other mistake that the Ligale Commission made was on consultation. They refused to consult the stakeholders on the basis that they were independent. Consultation does not make you less independent. I am glad that, at least, in this Bill, the Commission is forced to consult with all the stakeholders. That is an improvement. The effect of the Ligale Commission refusing to consult was that they made some errors. There were some typographical errors; for example, names of constituencies and wards were wrong. Some wards were placed in other districts. If they had consulted, those things would have been pointed out and their report would have been richer. We could have enriched their report but for some reasons, the Ligale Commission thought that if they consulted, then they were not independent. If you consult, it does not make you less independent. When at long last Parliament forced the Ligale Commission to consult, and this was only three days before the expiry of their term, even the Cabinet Committee that was established, we were able to sort out the Nairobi County issues. In the Nairobi County, there were basically three things that were wrong. One was with Dagoretti Constituency, which had a higher population than Westlands and Langata and yet, it had not been given any additional constituency. Westlands had been given two additional constituencies and Langata had been given three. Some parts of Dagoretti were hived off to create new constituencies in both Westlands and Langata. That was wrong and at long last, the Commission agreed that it was wrong and they rectified it. The next county that was to be sorted out was Mombasa, but we could not go there because the Commission’s term expired. So, I am basically guiding the Commission; please, consult the Members of Parliament and the public. They can only, but enrich your report and your report will not contain errors. The other mistake that the Commission made was with regard to provinces. Under the new Constitution, we have no provinces. We only have counties. They started by having provinces and then allocating constituencies according to provinces. They then said that, some provinces had been favoured by the Moi regime and, therefore, they wanted to have reverse discrimination. Again, that was wrong. It was not necessary. They did not follow the criteria stipulated by the Constitution. The other one is that they refused to consider the new districts that are already there. You cannot ignore them because they are there. So, I am requesting the Commission that when they start, they should start with constituencies and give all the districts constituencies. We have 258 districts; make them constituencies and then allocate the balance of 40 constituencies according to the criteria set out by the Constitution. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, some of us felt offended because in Kirinyaga County, we had agreed that Mwea Constituency should be split. In the order of population, we were number 28. Therefore, we felt offended that some constituencies that were number 60 were split and constituencies which had a higher population than others were not split. That made us feel offended and discriminated against. The Ligale Commission was not fair. With those remarks, I support."
}