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{
    "id": 56783,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/56783/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 374,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Kimunya",
    "speaker_title": "The Minister for Transport",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 174,
        "legal_name": "Amos Muhinga Kimunya",
        "slug": "amos-kimunya"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker. I think the point has been made – that if we all remove negative ethnicity from our minds, we will never need to worry about the background of the person seated next to you. That is the point I am making. I believe that when we get there, which I hope one day we will, we will not have to even put quotas because all Kenyans will be free to participate. We will not be saying: “Members of certain communities have exhausted their quotas. They need not apply for the following jobs“, which is exactly the kind of thing we are encouraging right now by saying that some communities have exhausted their quotas. So, we should actually be saying that they need not apply because they will not be considered for appointment. This is a question of whether we want to eat our cake and have it. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, this is the same argument we are putting in respect of the police. I like Eng. Gumbo’s argument and defence for the police. I hardly hear, in this House, anyone condemning the thugs who kill and molest people in their homes. I do not hear people condemning the rapists who have turned our girls into objects for them to play around with. All we hear is condemnation of the police for using excessive force and yet if we could sort out crime and live as civilised people, we would not even need to arm our police officers with guns and ammunition, as happens in the civilised world, where the police move around as part of the citizenry, creating order and helping people to go home. Even those who happen to have had one too many are taken home, because the work of the police is to assist people. In our country, nobody can walk out there feeling safe. When the police move in to rescue victims of crime, we quickly blame them instead of blaming the indiscipline and recklessness in our society. I am touched every time media houses replay a clip showing a traffic policeman being beaten up by a driver because he had stopped that driver, and because traffic policemen are not armed. Had that particular policeman been armed, he would have defended himself. There is nothing as humiliating as watching a person in uniform – a symbol of authority – being beaten up by the same people whom he is supposed to be protecting. Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, I believe these are the kinds of things we do not want to see as a House even as we talk of human rights. Human rights are both ways. Everyone, including police officers, has a right. I believe that when we take the debate too far, we will be ignoring the very people who protect us. The same issue comes up in terms of what we are calling “participatory processes” and “public participation”. It is good to encourage people to participate. It is constitutional. I believe that when we were drafting the issues at the Bomas of Kenya and encouraging people to participate, we recognised the fact that Kenya is a democracy and, therefore, people would be encouraged to participate by electing their leaders to make decisions on their behalf. I appreciate hon. Odhiambo-Mabona’s representation of a wider sector of Kenyans, and not an elective constituency. There is no better way of representing people and ensuring that they participate than through the 210 Members of Parliament who have been elected by the millions of Kenyans to come here and represent them and make decisions on their behalf, without resorting back to them."
}