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{
    "id": 759106,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/759106/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 52,
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "My objection is as follows and I beg of you to issue directions. There is a reason. In the Security Laws (Amendment) Bill 2014, your predecessor, Hon. Ethuro, was asked to confirm whether he had given his concurrence for tabling of the election of Security Laws (Amendment) Bill 2014 before it was tabled before the Senate. That matter ended up in the court. It transpired that there was no such concurrence. However, under Article 110 of the Constitution, you are required to have given consent for this Bill to be tabled either at the Senate or the National Assembly. Madam Temporary Speaker, now we have a situation which I am not sure is the practice in Parliaments anywhere in the world, where a Bill is published and tabled in the National Assembly and a similar one is published and tabled in the Senate. Sen. Murkomen has mentioned there will be election on 26th October, 2017. However, that does not mean that we take shortcuts for purposes of expediency. My concerns and the reason I am seeking for those directions is that this is a matter that might even end up in court. The Bill tabled in the National Assembly says it does not concern counties. It is the same Bill as the one published by Sen. Dullo. The one tabled before the Senate says it concerns counties. We cannot have it both ways. Madam Temporary Speaker, to me, what is more important is not the fact that somebody appears to be in a hurry to pass laws for purposes of the elections that are coming. My concern is, on what basis do we have a National Assembly Bill and a Senate Bill moving concurrently for purposes of elections and yet these are matters that concern the jurisdiction of the Senate? At the point where we will pass or reject this Bill, how are you going to transmit this Bill to the National Assembly? How will they transmit it to the Senate? Even before we form the Committee, you need to inform the country how you allowed this anomaly to come to the Floor of the Senate when it appears that under Article 110 of the Constitution, there should have been either concurrence so that this Bill either originates from the National Assembly and ends in the Senate or begins here and ends up in the National Assembly, for purposes of ensuring we do not have a contradiction in law. Lastly, it is absolutely important that you give those directions because the next Procedural Motion is a Committee which you have approved as a Motion which consists only of Members of the majority side and not the minority side. We need your directions so that as this Motion proceeds and as you reduce the time to whatever time – whether an hour or a day – those are directions that must be given so that we know whether there has been violation of the law. It concerns me that the amendments that have been tabled in the National Assembly might even proceed for assent by His Excellency the President before you complete the work that you are doing in the Senate. Are you engaging us in an academic exercise? Is this something that you are doing to fill in the gaps of finding something to do for the Senate?"
}