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{
"id": 977547,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/977547/?format=api",
"text_counter": 305,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. (Dr.) Mwaura",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 13129,
"legal_name": "Isaac Maigua Mwaura",
"slug": "isaac-mwaura"
},
"content": "Article 171(f) of the Constitution illustrates a situation where two advocates of the High Court can sit in the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) and at the same time practice before the same judges that he or she has approved. You will remember that this has been a very serious contestation around the case of Ahmed Nassir Abdullahi, Tom Ojienda and others, who represent the Law Society of Kenya (LSK). Therefore, some of these issues boil down to professional ethics. As we had noted, for every corruption case, there is a professional – there is an engineer, an accountant and all those people who are required – to conduct feasibility studies and make approvals. We, therefore, also need to ensure, through Private Bills – please, Members need to differentiate between Private Members Bills and Private Bills – so that we can institutionalize these professional bodies over and above the traditional ones of medicine, law, engineering and accounting. That way, we can use them as tools or repositories to ensure then that there is professional conduct and ethics to disbar people from practicing. That will become a very good incentive. Another key issue that comes out of this is the use of private business as shell companies that do not have the requisite competence to execute projects on the ground or rather, even legitimate companies being used to justify corruption by inflating costs. It has boiled down to the point where schools and colleges are being used to inflate the number of students or bursaries, and then monies go back to whoever has allocated these monies. This is becoming very important because why would you, for example, explain that there is a bursary kitty for the Member of County Assembly (MCA), Women representatives and the Member of Parliament (MP), and there is no management information system to see which student is getting what, where and how; or where these monies are going to yet this money is coming from the same Government? Even if it is what you call political mileage out of political philanthropy but using Government funds, but it is important to track it so that you can see whether there is double-dipping in terms of money being allocated to the very needy students. This then becomes a question where people become merchants of poverty, because then poverty gives the legitimacy to the need to occasion what I call development corruption. Also, in terms of fighting corruption, the role of political parties is very germane. Hong Kong is a largely democratic entity, and there is an agreement between mainland China and the City State of Hong Kong that they will continue practicing democracy up to 50 years; which is coming to a close. This is why Carrie Lam is having a lot of problems because she is backed by Beijing, but the people actually want to continue with their self-determination. Such that, then, the mien and the culture of the people of Hong Kong is different from mainland China. But then, one of the things you learn from mainland China is that element of the Chinese People’s Party (CPC). All civil servants are supposed to be member of the CPC so that they are subjected to the party’s supervisory and disciplinary commission. That means that when you are a member of the main political party – because there could be other affiliate parties – the party can discipline you. Therefore, party discipline is important. I was quite young, but I still remember, this is something that the Kenya African National Union (KANU) tried to achieve but with very disastrous results. We used to hear of the KANU Disciplinary Committee. However, it was not used to fight corruption, 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."
}