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{
    "id": 797796,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/797796/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 170,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "May 9, 2018 SENATE DEBATES 22 Sen. Wetangula",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Thank you, Madam Temporary Speaker, for giving me an opportunity to offer my critique on this Presidential Address. I was not fortunate to be present when the Address was made. I was elsewhere attending important matters. I have gone through the statement carefully. First, I appreciate the President for making a Speech that has a semblance of facts and truths. In his Speech, he has acknowledged the difficulties this country has gone through, especially election related difficulties. What he fell short of is after acknowledging that politics and elections have posed a serious challenge to our national cohesion, unity and peace, he fails to address the difficulties that the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has visited on this country. It is because of the incompetence, corruption and laxity of IEBC in the conduct of elections that this country nearly went to civil war in 2008. We cannot blame the current President for this. It is exactly for the same reason that this country was on the brink of collapse in 2013. It was again repeated in 2017. I expected the President, as he reaches out to his opponents to bring peace and tranquility, to have committed himself that part of his legacy is to leave this country with an IEBC that is akin to Ceaser’s wife; beyond suspicion and blemish. Madam Temporary Speaker, we cannot be going to elections every time and immediately, we have 100 petitions in court at whatever level. It is an indictment on the manner in which the elections have been conducted. Whether it is Members of County Assemblies (MCAs), Members of Parliament (MPs) or presidential candidates complaining, it tells a story that the management of our electoral process and systems has a flow that we need to address. As we speak, you can hear people shouting from the roof-top about the country going into a referendum. The same people shouting are the ones who have been saying that IEBC is incompetent to deliver any elections. How will the current IEBC deliver a referendum if they are incompetent to deliver any election? The referendum is an election. I suggest that we change our attitude. Let us not look for things that suits us for the moment. Let us focus on how to reform IEBC like our sister country Ghana, where the presidential election is held and the winner has a margin of 23,000 votes only and nobody casts a stone, goes to the streets, calls the other names or shouts. Everybody accepts the results because they have been conducted in a free, fair, democratic and acceptable manner. We cannot say the same for our country. Many Members here are sitting on the edge because they are not sure whether tables can be turned against them. We cannot go to elections where winners are declared losers and losers are declared winners and then we are told, shake hands, accept and move on."
}