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{
    "id": 619191,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/619191/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 395,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Bunyasi",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2511,
        "legal_name": "John Sakwa Bunyasi",
        "slug": "john-sakwa-bunyasi"
    },
    "content": "Service Commission (PSC) or the Executive. If we do that, Kenyans will progressively gain confidence in the governance system that is before them. In respect of the Judiciary, it was right and proper for resources for the JSC to be increased. It turned out to be a factor of 500 per cent with the net increase of 400 per cent. That was the right thing to do. That is what the Constitution required. It is the best thing that Kenya ever saw at the time. However, as it turns out, and now this is with the wisdom of hindsight, there was tremendous spending exuberance. There is sort of happiness around spending this money in ways that are touched on, but did not look at the procurement law, for instance. It may well have been okay had it not been for the fact that in some cases you get the sense that there was personal gain in the decisions that were being made. It was simply a question of getting these structures quickly and perhaps forgetting a step here and a step there. We may still have condemned it, but not with the same weight as we have done in this case. It seems that in the spending decisions, there was an element of potential gain. That is what must be fought vigorously in the Judiciary and in all the three arms of the Government. It would have been wonderful if this debate was being held in August, 2014, one or two months after the Report was prepared. It is now more than a year-and-a-half. We commented earlier this week about the need for the House Business Committee (HBC) to prioritise urgent reports that have been brought before the House. That is before they are outdated. We make recommendations here that are two or three years old because these things had happened before the Special Report. As much as it is less of history, I know it can still be an input in any follow- up action that might arise in any other institution. It is one year-and-a-half since the Report was presented to the House, and two to three years since the acts were committed. There are interesting findings in this Report on the Judiciary. JKUATES Ltd. would be one worth mentioning. I mention it for two reasons. One, the JKUATES Ltd. produced a valuer for the Judiciary that looked at the house that was meant for the CJ. Although it was JKUATES Ltd. sending, it was sending somebody affiliated to it and who was not certified to do the valuation. It took the Architectural Association of Kenya (AAK) to say the person sent was not a member in good standing as she did not have the right qualifications. The JKUATES Ltd. had the embarrassing situation of backtracking and saying: “Actually, she was not doing evaluation; we simply asked her to give us an indication of the neighbourhood of price.” That was a very lame excuse. Negotiations then proceeded around the indication she gave in the neighbourhood of price, which is what valuers do. They give you a neighbourhood of price that you can either accept or reject. That was a major mistake on the part of JKUATES Ltd. Two, the same JKUATES Ltd. acted as if they had a firm that could bid. Actually, it is simply lecturers who have organised themselves and are using the university name. However, it is not being taken up by line architects who are all members of staff of the JKUATES Ltd. Again, JKUATES Ltd. was fronting itself to help the lecturers, under a line architect, to avoid competition in bidding so that it is considered a government to government transaction when it is just a bunch of perhaps well qualified people who do not want to go through the procurement procedure specified in law. These occurrences have shaken the very foundation of the Judiciary in many ways. You do not get a sense of responsible action. However, my prayer is this: It must not be a situation where sharks see the blood in water. This must also be an occasion when we want to involve everybody we may have wanted but we had no way of doing it. In all fairness, everybody must get his or her share of consideration; that is from the top to the bottom. There may have been 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."
}