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{
    "id": 670650,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/670650/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 251,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Katoo",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 199,
        "legal_name": "Judah Katoo Ole-Metito",
        "slug": "judah-ole-metito"
    },
    "content": "I think it is good we give our views because the first term of reference for the Committee is to inquire into the allegations against IEBC. In the inquiry, some of the documents the Committee is going to use will be the HANSARD Reports of both Houses. Therefore, what Members who get a chance to contribute will say will be one of the sources of information that the Committee will refer to when they are inquiring into how Members and Kenyans in general feel about IEBC. We need to urge those in the Committee that when they write their report, to remove partiality in IEBC. The Commission should not be politically appointed. We should have a process of appointing IEBC commissioners who have no political inclination. That is when we will have an impartial IEBC. The other issue is efficiency. We need an efficient IEBC. Right now, IEBC has nine commissioners. You remember we formed those commissions in the 10th Parliament when we had the Grand Coalition Government. The minimum number of commissioners was to be three and the maximum number was to be nine. But because of vested interests, we put all commissions to a maximum of nine commissioners. I think that is becoming very costly to the country and it is not serving any purpose with regard to efficiency. We should just have three commissioners, maybe, on full-time basis, or a maximum of five who will be on a part-time basis. The bottom line is that we should have a lean commission with part-time commissioners. Currently, we have a very bloated secretariat in the IEBC. If you ask the Departmental Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs to give us a list of all those in the secretariat, you will be surprised. Just like in any other commission, the secretariat of the Commission is too large. We need a lean secretariat with skills and technical expertise that is required to do that job. The other mandate is to have an accurate, secure, verifiable, accountable and transparent IEBC. The IEBC is about voting. Therefore, the process before, during and after voting should be very accurate, secure, verifiable, accountable and transparent. We need to make the announcement of results at the polling stations final. We should stop having what we call provisional results. The presiding officer at the polling station should be the final referee with respect to all ballots. For instance, why is the presiding officer the final referee with respect to all the other ballots, except the presidential election? He or she should be the final referee for all ballots, from the member of the county assembly (MCA), member of parliament, governor, senator and the president. What is announced at the polling station should be final for everyone. That is where you have agents who certify the results. Those are the views we want this Committee to take into account. We should also make the Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) a reality. It should really work from day one when you are registering to the day of voting and when you are counting. It should not function when you are registering and voting, but fail to function when you are counting. I think we should be serious on this. For us to achieve the objective of this Select Committee, that has to be done. As we talk of IEBC, we should be able to amalgamate all the electoral laws. This is the chance to correct the anomalies in the Constitution with respect to electoral laws. For instance, the date of elections is contradictory. The Constitution says the national Parliament shall be elected on the second Tuesday of August in the fifth year. When does the fifth year start? When you go the next page, the county elections are after five years. In the next page, the Constitution says both the national and county elections have to be done on the same day. There are a lot of contradictions. Therefore, this Committee should go beyond its mandate and look at how we can harmonise those provisions. Right now, some MCAs have gone to court saying they will not vacate their offices until March 2018 because that is when their term is ending. This Committee 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."
}