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{
    "id": 592977,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/592977/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 520,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. (Eng.) Gumbo",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 24,
        "legal_name": "Nicholas Gumbo",
        "slug": "nicholas-gumbo"
    },
    "content": "vast responsibilities. If you look at the responsibilities of this body under Clause 17, they are so many. It can do almost anything within the petroleum sector. But, who are the members of this Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority? The membership is the chairperson who is appointed by the President, the CS responsible for energy and petroleum, the CS for the National Treasury and then the Director-General. Then, there is a provision there which says: “Five other members appointed by the CS,” yet there is no procedure or nothing for that sort. This House and the representatives of the people have no role, whatsoever. Are we not creating problems? What have we learnt from what is happening in the Niger Delta, if we can give an appointee of the President, somebody who is not a representative of the people, these many powers? This is a very important Bill. I request my good friend, Hon. Naomi Shaban, that we do not rush the Committee Stage of this Bill. Let us give Members enough time to tooth comb this Bill; if we do not get this Bill right, you will be seeing what you see in the Niger Delta. Today, if you overfly the Niger Delta in Nigeria, you will see floating dead bodies. It is like a part of the world that the gods forgot. Kenya does not ever wish to go in that direction. I am happy with the provisions on environment and health safety (EHS). Even as we look at these provisions on EHS, let us uphold transparency in the exploitation of petroleum resources in this Bill as we come to the Committee Stage. I expected a clause dedicated to transparency in exploitation in this Bill. Without transparency--- The moment we encapsulate everything in the exploitation of these resources in opaqueness, we are not going to have it right. As I conclude, I will just request one more minute. I attended a conference in Tanzania recently. After I spoke, one of the Tanzanians told me that you Kenyans are doing very well. You have the wealthiest person in East Africa, but you also have the poorest person. That is not the label that we want to carry. We still have a problem. Exploitation of petroleum resources can help us to bridge this gap. Kenyans will be much better for it. We cannot all be equal, but if we can reduce this gap between the wealthiest person and the poorest person, we will not need to spend more money buying armoured cars, guns or equipping our armed forces, because the people whose numbers are growing exponentially, will be the security we need."
}