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{
    "id": 492912,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/492912/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 219,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Ogolla",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1264,
        "legal_name": "Gideon Ochanda Ogolla",
        "slug": "gideon-ochanda-ogolla"
    },
    "content": "Speaker has taken a lot of time in terms of briefing them, it is not in good faith. In fact, all of them agreed that it is something that needs to work and we should proceed with it. I think that must have been unfair to this House. There are things that we talk about in governance, for instance, principles of independence of public institutions and separation of powers. What we raise in terms of independence of public institutions does not mean that the institutions stand alone. They do not stand alone. There is no way a public institution will even stand alone. If you look at what the Constitution provides in Article 6, in terms of inter-dependence and whether or not we have public institutions vertically or horizontally arranged, there has to be some level of where one institution relates to the other. There is a relational arrangement between institutions in as much as they are separate and in as much as we talk about independence. There is no way we can say that now that the Executive is separate from Parliament, then the two must stand alone. If we said so, then I think we will not be going anywhere. There is a connection between Parliament and the Executive. Parliament does the work of policy approvals, legislation and oversight. It can only do that when the Executive exists. So, there is that kind of a relational arrangement between those public institutions. So, there is no way we can insist and say that independence means that one must stop at one moment and another one goes to the other direction. That is mis-reading of the principles that we have in governance. It is clear that the Executive must account for its actions and it must be answerable to the public. The best way to be answerable to the public is through the representatives of the people and that is this Parliament. The President has lamented over a period of time that we are in a situation where Cabinet Secretaries are summoned by Parliament many times. That is the time they needed to have looked at this thing seriously. They would have seen that the time the Cabinet Secretaries will take to appear here for the purpose of the Committee on General Oversight would be much shorter and more appropriate because many Members would be much more satisfied. When a Statement is read and is not satisfactory, you will call the Cabinet Secretary to appear before the Committee again. It becomes something that does not end. The best approach and opportunity that we have is when those Cabinet Secretaries appear in this kind of an arrangement so that they are able to answer and respond to supplementary questions that follow substantive issues. Then there is the whole issue of contradictions that we have been seeing before. When we say that the Chairperson of a Committee comes before us and talks as though he or she is a Cabinet Secretary, that is something we cannot close our eyes on for too long. That is something that is not practical. We have reached a situation where it is important that it is considered. Hon. Speaker, one of the institutions that is supposed to midwife the constitutional implementation process and the transitional arrangements is the CIC. Many times, the CIC has tended to be very reactive rather than offering solutions. They wait until individuals or institutions come up with certain actions and they run ahead to say that it is wrong. They do not come forward early enough to identify the transitional challenges that we have. This is the time when CIC needed to have offered advice instead of being reactionary. They are not supposed to constantly come out to say this or that is wrong or it cannot be done like this or that without providing solutions and suggestions in terms of how we should move forward. This is where we really want to fault the 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."
}