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{
    "id": 49548,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/49548/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 462,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Keynan",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 41,
        "legal_name": "Adan Wehliye Keynan",
        "slug": "adan-keynan"
    },
    "content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, these things must be done hand in hand. We must reform the Judiciary and also come up with a working Electoral and Boundaries Bill. I want to congratulate the Minister for Justice, National Cohesion and Constitutional Affairs. Although at times he says a lot of things, it is good to speak his mind. If we reform the Judiciary, we will have a free election. Let us have a fair Bill that takes into account the regional, ethnic and religious diversities of Kenya. Regardless of whether a community is categorized as small and another one is considered numerically strong in Kenya, we are all equal in the eyes of the law and in the eyes of God. We are all equal under the flag of the Republic of Kenya. This reality must dawn on all of us. So, those of us who are products of a policy of assimilation, those of us who are sons and daughters of colonial collaborators, those of us who are products of the petty bourgeois must respect that this is not a country of classes. This is a country of 40 million Kenyans who must be respected at all times and their interests remain supreme. This Bill proposes that after the Commission goes round and completes its work, it shall report to the President. I thought we are running away from the era of an imperial presidency. Why do you want to take us back to where we left? You are not sure who is going to be the President. President Kibaki might be a very good President, but you are not sure who is going to be the next President of Kenya. Why do you want to take us back to that era of darkness? Why can we not have institutional separation? Why can you not allow the Commission to do an independent job and gazette or bring it to Parliament? Why should we have the report of an independent Commission subject to the approval of the Executive? In my opinion, this is an anomaly which should not be accepted. This is what this Bill proposes. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we will be proposing amendments to delete that particular section, so that this Commission either gazettes its report directly or brings it to Parliament for the Members of Parliament to familiarize themselves with it and gazette it. This Bill again talks about doing this and that before the 2012 elections. The elections in 2012 will just be an annual event. It is going to be one event in our calendar. We need to have a Bill for posterity. If whatever we are going to do here is geared towards the 2012 general elections, then we are bound to fail because everybody is going to focus on 2012 and those are the failures that we had in 2007. Therefore, any reference to 2012 must again be deleted from this Bill. We have had the Ligale Report. It is a reality that we have had the first review. It is a reality that under the able leadership of colleagues in the Parliamentary Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs, the Committee sat down and came up with a compromise that accommodated all the issues that came up as a result of the Ligale Report. We cannot assume that we are operating in a vacuum. This must be the basis of anything that we are going to do. Taking into account the limited time that we have, we cannot run away from this reality. This Bill must be constitutional. The Ligale Report should be centred, oriented and placed. This is going to be the essence and you know the sentiments of the majority of the Members of Parliament, but that does not mean that we trample on the rights of other Kenyans who have raised these issues. That must also be taken into account, but within the framework of what was said. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we have a generous Constitution. It took us years and courageous Kenyans to shed blood for us to have the current Constitution. We are not saying that it is perfect but, at least, it gives us a working document. This document must be respected and it cannot be trashed. At times when I see that a document that has cost us over Kshs40 billion--- Those who struggled for the first multipartism, like Kenneth Matiba, Charles Rubia and those who disagreed with the"
}