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{
    "id": 939569,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/939569/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 382,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. (Dr.) Mwaura",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13129,
        "legal_name": "Isaac Maigua Mwaura",
        "slug": "isaac-mwaura"
    },
    "content": "people have been arrested and confused for what they are not; they have been said to be personifying themselves. They have even been given wrong titles. Let me give you an example. One day I received a call from Ryan Muiruri. He had been detained for four hours at a bank in Limuru because they thought he was using the wrong kind of ID. I had to call Achieng, the police lady, who was convinced to release Ryan. Ryan the other day had to almost undress at the immigration so that he could get a passport to travel. There is also a story about a young lady named Simon and the kind of humiliation she underwent in Siaya County. We were with you when we recently had the breakfast organized jointly by the Intersex Persons Implementation Committee. These are very compelling stories. When you hear of a parent like Peter Maingi having to sell all his property so that they can get money to fund this corrective surgery and there is no end in sight. We hear doctors telling parents to go to their clinics for five years continuously, milking money from them and yet they do not have a solution. People losing their livelihoods and time; the agony and stigma. This is the time that we need to rise as a House to ensure that this cannot happen again. Why do we say so? This is because all of us here are parents, grandparents, future parents and future grandparents and it could happen that you get a child who is intersex. In fact, I was sharing with one of the Senators who told me that he has been brought an intersex person and he does not know what to do with that child. So, it is a matter that we need to take up seriously and I believe that we can amend this Registration of Persons Act and provide for procedures so that even at birth, children are not forced to undergo surgery because of the expectation of the society that, which child did you give birth to, was it a boy or a girl? Parents have been doing that. When they force surgery on a child, it means that this child, upon attainment of puberty, when the body expresses itself towards a certain sex orientation, then it is a misnomer. We have had situations where parents have got a child and they named the child to be a boy but then upon puberty, the body expresses to be a girl. However they had already interfered with the reproductive organs of a female. So, then, what do you tell that boy? We have also had cases where a child was seen to be a girl and then they did away with the male reproductive sex organs; the child now expresses himself as a boy but he no longer has the vital organs of a boy. You can imagine that kind of a thing. It is extremely fundamental and definitive. This is the essence of being. Just pause for a moment and imagine yourself, if you did not know whether you are a male or female; but you are tossed this way and that way. You cannot quite figure it out. I have sat for hours, I have walked the journey with these fellow Kenyans and I think that there is urgency to ensure that we confer to them the citizenship and recognition that is due to them. There have been contestations about; is this the introduction of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) issues in the background? No! There is a difference about this because when we talk about intersex people, we are talking about children born that way. That is something that I want to re-emphasize because it is always thrown at us; who are you talking about? Are you talking about people who are transgender? No, The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}