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"id": 953088,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/953088/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Suba North, ODM",
"speaker_title": "Hon. (Ms.) Odhiambo-Mabona",
"speaker": {
"id": 376,
"legal_name": "Millie Grace Akoth Odhiambo Mabona",
"slug": "millie-odhiambo-mabona"
},
"content": " Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker. Let me take this opportunity to congratulate Hon. Martha for bringing this Bill. I think it is very timely. People say that great minds think alike. I currently have the Reproductive Healthcare Bill that has almost exactly the same provisions. The reason why I made the provisions under the Reproductive Healthcare Bill is because when you have people who are adopting children, they will actually be the real parents by law and psychologically. These will be the real parents of the child, but you cannot have a situation where you give other parents an opportunity to bond with the children and yet adoptive parents are not given that opportunity. Under the Children’s Act, they are given three months within which they are supposed to bond. Where do you get these three months? Those three months are actually the basis upon which the Children Officer will come and do an assessment and give a report back to court as to whether you are actually a fit parent or whether you can adopt. However, if you do not get that opportunity to bond and be with the child, then it becomes problematic. It is unfortunate that Hon. Otiende has left. He has raised a very significant issue on gender inequality that men are given two weeks paternity leave and women are given three months under the Employment Act, which he considers unconstitutional. Unfortunately, nature gave that bias. Recently, I saw in one country that because of technology and because of issues of LGBT, men can physically give birth to children. However, that is not the situation in Kenya as we speak. So, there are no men giving physical birth. So, they are not then faced with the actual physical challenges that women go through. I recently had to learn a lot when I was dealing with the Reproductive Healthcare Bill, for example, postpartum issues like lochi and all that. So, the role of men is supposed to be supportive and also bond with the child. However, because of the way we are socialised, a lot of women are giving feedback that when their husbands are on leave for those two weeks; they end up taking care of two babies, the husband and the baby. So, first we must reengineer the way our men think so that when they are now on paternity leave, they do not become the first big baby when the wife is also taking care of another baby. So, let the men first get used to the two weeks and they socialise their thinking so that they know that within these two weeks, they are supposed to provide social support to their wives and not vice versa. You find a man whose wife has just given birth asking the wife to go to the river and fetch water. It should now be vice versa. You are the one who should now help in getting the water, cooking and all the nice things. Let our men also learn to be romantic. When Hon. Otiende talks about, for instance, Akuku Danger, you know our realities now dictates that if you are an Akuku Danger, you are an outlier. People can hardly cope with just one family; one man and a few children. What business do you have trying to marry too many wives so that you can have leave? That leave will not be of benefit to you. You will die of stress by having multiple partners. If AIDS does not catch up with you, you will die of stress. Very many people here, and even Members, can tell you that it is difficult taking care of small families that we have. I encourage Hon. Otiende Amollo that there is one issue that he has raised which is The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposes only. Acertified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}