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{
    "id": 48626,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/48626/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 478,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Kabando wa Kabando",
    "speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister for Youth Affairs and Sports",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 31,
        "legal_name": "Kabando wa Kabando",
        "slug": "kabando-kabando"
    },
    "content": "As my colleagues said, we cannot have a Board that is subservient to the Secretariat or the management. The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission needs to have a Chairman and Vice-Chairman who are executive. They will be making decisions for this country. But at the same time, we should also reconsider the requirement that the Chairman of this Commission must be a lawyer. There is no proven record anywhere in the world that only a lawyer has exclusive understanding, knowledge and capability in the area of law. If we are saying that in a country like Kenya, even the super powers such as America and the most inhabited nations such as China and India with 1.5 billion and 1.2 billion people, respectively, CEOs of those nations preside over policies on finance and foreign affairs. Here, we are saying a singular commission must be limited in its chairmanship to one profession. That is one issue that I plead with the Minister. Actually I do not think there is any preferential treatment that is anchored in the Constitution which cannot be shifted in order to open space for all Kenyans. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, secondly, I have looked at the requirements or qualifications for the person to occupy the position of the Chief Executive Officer (CEO); that is the Secretary of the Commission and found that they need to have knowledge in management, public administration, law, political science, finance and electoral issues. What about that individual who is causing a revolution in the Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) in the twitter world, in Facebook, in Google and in Yahoo? Are we saying that finance, political science, labour laws and electoral laws are more anchored? I think in this time when we are communicating more, not through paper and postage but through other methods that are technologically superior to what we have had before, it would be important to attract ICT gurus or the young professionals existing in this country who are making pesa which cannot be found in any other part of the world; not in the United States of America or Europe. So, I urge the Minister, as he moves the amendments to consider having a CEO who can come from all those fields including the ICT. The other issue is that the CEO, as it has been said by my colleagues, should not be above the Board. The CEO is the Chief Executive Officer. Human Resource (HR) manuals prescribe the responsibilities of a managing director of a group CEO. We cannot purport, as a Parliament, to now decline to accept the basic prescriptions for CEOs in institutions and make an anomaly which disagrees with the universal prescriptions or requirements of a CEO. His or her work is to execute the mandate of a board. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I know that this House has been advised that this Bill will be referred to the Constitutional Implementation Oversight Committee (CIOC). It is a serious indictment of the Tenth Parliament that because of political brinkmanship; that because of petty greed by political parties towards 2012 that the most important Committee in charge of legal affairs and justice in this country is in quagmire or disagreements and, now, we are submitting to political machinations orchestrated to give short-term solutions."
}