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{
    "id": 718779,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/718779/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 140,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. Kajwang’",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 2712,
        "legal_name": "Tom Joseph Kajwang'",
        "slug": "kajwang-tom-joseph-francis"
    },
    "content": "This is the point. There are so many boys languishing in prison for terms of 10 or 15 years and life imprisonment for the charges of rape, defilement and attempted rape. Nobody says that rape should be dealt with by a lesser term or we should not be strict or not increase the punitive terms for rape, attempted rape or sexual offences. At the same time we must be judicious about the fate of several children who find themselves imprisoned. If a child is convicted at the age of 16 and he is given a 15-year sentence at the minimum, he comes out of jail at the age of 30 or more years. Sometimes they go for life imprisonment. The statute has been defined in such a way that it gives judges very little opportunity in terms of sentencing. The drafter of this legislation did not get it right. The point should not have been to decrease or bring down the age of consent. That is not possible. It is disgusting to think that you can reduce the age of consent. It is disgusting. What we should be talking about is that if a child is convicted on those terms, is there a way in which we can make those young people useful in the society or to themselves? Are we able to graduate sentences or find alternative sentencing which is effective and will punish the offence but also preserve the boy-child? Judges will tell you how there is a very livid example of this case which went to the Court of Appeal of a boy who was convicted. He was handed down a sentence of life in prison yet the facts of the case would have been dealt with in a different manner."
}