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{
    "id": 574010,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/574010/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 139,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Onyura",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 12833,
        "legal_name": "Michael Aringo Onyura",
        "slug": "michael-aringo-onyura"
    },
    "content": "Thank you very much, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to also make a contribution to this Bill. It is a Bill that is timely. I was reading the objects and the memorandum and I find that it is going to modernise the company law that had become moribund, obsolete and outdated in certain sections. The good thing is that the Departmental Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs that was dealing with this Bill did a good job. I went through the Report that they prepared after going through the Bill particularly with regard to public participation. I was impressed to see that they have an impressive list of strong individual and corporate representatives. However, I did not see the Law Society of Kenya (LSK) when I was looking through it. I thought the LSK will be a very key stakeholder and a strong interested party in this. I also did not see much participation from our universities. This is because I would have imagined that our faculties of law would have taken a lot of interest in this because this company law/commercial area is of great interest to the universities. Looking at this whole volume of over 1,600 pages I think it will form a whole department in the faculty. I thought they would take interest in this. Perhaps they can be invited in the next stage so that they can also give their input. It was encouraging to see that there has been incorporation of best practices in various countries, particularly in the United Kingdom. It is also going to create a very good and conducive environment that will allow good corporate governance that we have been talking about. We are actually thinking about filing of tax returns and the general area of accountability and transparency which is very much stressed. I also hope that the areas of corporate social responsibility, fair play, fair competition and pricing can be properly regulated through this Act. I just wanted to also mention a feature that normally happens. This has to do with retention of records at the Registrar’s offices where you find files disappearing for one reason or another every now and then. This is something that needs to be looked at and regulated so that we do not have people with bad intention on us or this country hiding behind corporate persons or corporate legal persons. All in all, I strongly support and thank the Departmental Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs and all the other people who have been involved in drafting this very critical law that will play a very important role in our economy and commerce, both locally and in the region. With those remarks, I support the Bill. Thank you. 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."
}