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{
    "id": 847486,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/847486/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 344,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Tiaty, KANU",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Kassait Kamket",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13493,
        "legal_name": "William Kamket Kassait",
        "slug": "william-kamket-kassait"
    },
    "content": "Evidence-Based Policy Solutions’. The Kenyan delegation was led by the Speaker of the Senate, Hon. Ken Lusaka. Among the membership that went to this meeting was Senator Enoch Wambua, Senator Susan Kihika, Hon. Owen Baya, Hon. Vincent Tuwei, Hon. Nasri Ibrahim and I. One of the key highlights of the conference was the election of Senator Kihika as the Vice-President of the Women Parliamentary Caucus of the IPU. It is also good to note that the Speaker of the Senate, Hon. Lusaka, sits on the Executive Committee of the IPU. The other Members were not able to contest other positions in the standing committees, for instance, the Standing Committee on Peace and International Security, the Standing Committee on Sustainable Development, Finance and Trade and many other committees. There was an interest in the Forum for Young Parliamentarians. Due to the presence of our Speaker, Hon. Lusaka, on the Executive Committee, we were not able to contest other positions as per the rules of the IPU. At the IPU Conference this year on the matter of refugees, one of the highly debated issues was the rights of refugees to vote in the countries that they live in. That matter was debated and left to the parliaments of the world to look into and look at our UN Resolutions to see whether it is possible, in future, to allow refugees to vote in the countries that they live in. In this year’s conference, you will also note that most of the Members of this delegation were fairly new. They had not attended IPU conference before. There was a near mistake that raised the issue of the need for institutional memory in such international forums. During one of the sessions, there was a heated debate on the consequences of the United States of America (USA) declaration of Jerusalem as the Capital of Israel and the USA moving its embassy to Jerusalem. There was a very heated debate in the plenary. We were caught up in the debate as Members of the delegation. As we were about to take a vote on this very important debate, we were lucky to have been reminded by the secretariat that Kenya belongs to the non-aligned status in terms of international diplomacy and we lost the opportunity to vote on such a very lively Motion. Suffice it to say, the delegation was very ably represented by the Members who were present. I do not want to labour this House that much. The resolutions are as contained in this Report. I will be highlighting some of the resolutions so that Members may have time to look at the Report and read it for themselves. One of the key resolutions that came up from this Conference was the one that I spoke of earlier on the consequences of the USA declaration on Jerusalem and the rights of the Palestinian people in Jerusalem in light of the UN Chapter and Resolutions. Just as a highlight, the Conference called on parliamentarians to urge their governments to recognise the State of Palestine along the 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital in accordance with the UN Resolutions. That was a very emotive issue and as I said, this Resolution was adopted by a vote. Without much ado, the recommendations of the Kenyan delegation are that this House notes this Report. Therefore, this House follows up on the implementation of the declaration and resolution of the 138th IPU Assembly and related meetings. I ask Hon. Owen Baya to second."
}