February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Tuesday, 13th February, 2018

Hon. Senators, it is my pleasure and privilege to welcome you back to the Senate for the Second Session of the Twelfth Parliament.

As you may recall, the First Session of this term was greatly affected by the prolonged electoral process in the country as well as delays in appointing House Leadership and constituting Select Committees of the Senate. This meant that we did not quite take-off as anticipated in the discharge of our functions and mandate.

I am happy to note that the Senate Leadership Offices are now fully constituted. Consequently, I take this opportunity to congratulate the Majority and Minority Leaders and their Deputies as well as the Majority and Minority Whips and their Deputies on their election.

I am also happy to note that the Select Committees of the House are now fully constituted, and extend my congratulations to the Chairpersons and Vice-Chairpersons elected to lead these committees.

Hon. Senators, the Senate is now ready for take-off. We have before us the singular duty and mandate of delivering on the devolution promise to Kenyans. This Session is particularly important as it will lay the foundation for and define what the Senate will be able to do and achieve during this term. I, therefore, call upon each one of us, right from the outset, to re-commit and re-dedicate ourselves to the achievement of our constitutional mandate.

Hon. Senators, as I stated in this House on 31st August last year, following my election as your Speaker, this Senate must be able to distinguish itself from and build on

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Mr. Speaker, Sir, thank you very much for that opportunity. I beg to give notice of the followingMotion:-

THAT, pursuant to Standing Orders No.178 and 183 (3) , the Senate approves the following Senators to be Members of the Senate Business Committee:

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

I beg to move the following Motion:-

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, Sir. I think this issue came here before and there was a ruling on it that there are Members of this House who have national awards and titles. In my entire stay in Parliament, this is where those awards are supposed to be recognised. I am sure Sen. Kenneth Lusaka, in the performance of his duties as a Speaker, has been given some award and I think he must be, I think Elder of the Order of the Golden Heart of Kenya (EGH) , Chief of the Order of the Golden Heart of Kenya CGH, Member of Parliament MP or something. Sen. Wetangula, I am sure, is EGH and MP, having served as a Cabinet Secretary (CS) and all that. So, some of us have all these titles.

I raised this matter before and there was a ruling that in future, those titles and awards must be reflected when you are referring to Members on official documents like this.

Is the Senate Majority Leader in order not to comply with the orders that were given by the Chair?

Mr. Speaker, Sir, I totally concur with the point of order raised by Sen. Khaniri. I would be more than happy to see my name there reading EGH. I have no problem with that suggestion. I considered in the course of these proceedings that we will bring the necessary amendments before the end of the day to capture the titles such as EGH, including for Senior Counsel,James Orengo. So, if that is permitted, with your permission, I can proceed and then we will bring the amendments?

Mr. Speaker, Sir, I beg to move the following Motion:- THAT, pursuant to Standing Orders No.178 and 183 (3) , the Senate approves the following Senators to be Members of the Senate Business Committee:

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Sen. Madzayo, what is your point of order?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir. Another point of order was raised and it requested for clarification particularly with regard to whether one is an EGH, OBS or whatever. These are basically political tittles. I was wondering whether that would also include professional tittles like Doctor, Engineer and Professor.

Mr. Speaker Sir, protect me from the other Senators here.

Proceed, Senator.

Mr. Speaker, Sir, I would like to get further clarification as to whether even architects and so forth can be along those lines.

Including Chiefs and Kings. Mr. Speaker Sir, I have no problem with a clarification being sought by Rtd. Justice Sen. Madzayo. However, the problem is that it is totally unprocedural for him to just rise up somewhere from the blues. There was no point of order. He just asked for clarification. There is nothing like clarification.

Proceed, the Senate Majority Leader.

Mr. Speaker, Sir, that subject was dispensed with long time ago. It was not part of the issues that were on the Floor. Being a senior person who has been here serving a second term, he should have known the procedure. That is why in his second term, he should not be making certain mistakes and attempting to confuse the Speaker.

Now that I am being requested to keep it brief, I was at the point where I was saying that as Senate, the Senate Business Committee needs to prioritize certain legislation and certain businesses this time round, for example, businesses that are related to oversight of the counties. I was making this point because there is an outcry out there that members of the public feel like the Senate needs to do more to ensure that the resources that are given to the counties are felt by the common mwananchi.

In that regard, I was making this case that the question of the Senate Oversight Fund is something we do not want to debate forever. We must bring it to a closure. We have had so much criticism from the National Assembly, the Executive at the national level, opinion leaders and so forth. When we brought the solution that makes the office of the Senator capable and able to deliver on the mandate of the Senator of oversight of thecounties, many people chickened out and started saying that giving Senators money will make them politically strong and so forth, yet the amount of money that is being

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, Sir. Let me join the leadership of the House in welcoming everybody back after the last Session. It gives me great pleasure to support this Motion. It is an important Motion because it relates to a very important Committee of the House that has to determine not only the way the business of the House will be managed, but also what business comes to the House.

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Sen. (Prof) Ongeri

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir. I rise to support this Motion. Like many Senators who have spoken before me did, I welcome all the Senators to this sitting because we have serious business to transact in this august House.

I have spent a considerable period of time going around my county and many other areas within the country. One thing that has struck me most is that, previously, it was very easy to fetch water for drinking or for cooking purposes in our homes from the springs. However, I never thought that a county like Kisii or Nyamira will run dry of water. One of the issues we need to address in this Senate is provision of drinking water for animals and domestic use. I believe the Senate Majority Leader will be able to fast- track this matter urgently because our people are suffering. To me, if we will be able to achieve that single element on how to provide water to our nation, we will have gone a long way and it will give us a stamp of approval as a House that works in a bipartisan manner.

I am looking forward to a robust Bill being presented before this House, not on an ad hoc basis of drilling a dam here or there, but that will address the provision of water to our people because it has now reached an emergency level. Year in, year out, we experience drought. With regard to this issue, we cannot sit pretty and hope that

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Sen. Mutula Kilonzo Jnr.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker Sir. I rise to support this important Motion. As I do so, I am disappointed that what I thought would be a practice that we left in the last Senate has continued and persisted. I begin to wonder whether if that is the position taken by the National Assembly and we have not done anything about it on two important Bills. One of them is The Physical Planning Bill, 2017. The National Lands Commission sent The Physical Planning Bill, 2017 to us which is in consonance

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

just another House. We are actually what

“The Upper House with lower powers.” Those are the words he uses. The other one is the “Lower House” with higher privileges or something like that. I feel sad.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir, for giving me the opportunity to support this Motion. The formation of the Senate Business Committee is a very important agenda before we start our business. I congratulate all the Members who have been named and support them because we have senior politicians here. We also have experts in their own rights and we know that they will drive the business of the House in a very honourable manner. We look forward to having a very good agenda this Session because we have lost a little bit of time before we went for recess. Further, I take this opportunity to welcome all my colleagues back to the House and wish them well even as they interact not only here but with the constituents because the real business is now starting.

Going forward, there is one item that was mentioned by the Senate Majority Leader, that we need to start asking ourselves how our oversight role is being handled. One of the urgent agendas we must deal with is how, as the Senate, we deal with oversight. Facilitation of oversight is something that begins from creating a Senate and

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Thank you Mr. Speaker, Sir, for giving me this opportunity. I rise to support this Motion. However, before I get to that, on behalf of the people of Narok County, I would like to send my message of condolences to the Senator of Nyamira County, Sen. Omogeni, for the loss of his mother. I would like to call upon all Members to reach out to the Senator and support him during this hard time.

Secondly, I would like to delve into the issues of this House. I have said this severally and I want to repeat it; that this is, indeed, the House of union. What can set us aside is when we try to become visionaries; we must deal with issues of this country in a bipartisan way. The only way that we are going to be remembered in this country as able men and women who came during trying times and united the country is if we set our differences aside and discuss our issues during these trying times. We should agree that we must defend the independence of the three arms of Government.

When I was growing up, I longed for the time when I would stand and say that I live in a democracy that respects separation of powers. If we turn a blind eye on that, then we will not know what to defend. I came to this House because I believe in the independence of Parliament. I also believed in the independence of the Judiciary and the Executive. These are very trying moments. I have just heard that the Attorney General, Githu Muigai, has resigned and someone else has already been appointed. The Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) also resigned yet they were in constitutional offices that give them time to serve this country well.

During this second Session of the Twelfth Parliament, I would like to call upon all the Members in the Senate Business Committee to approach the business of this House in a bipartisan manner. I might be strong in certain things, but I should be ready to consider what the people who brought us here would like to say. We want a country where you can proudly say that whenever we have a problem, we can sit down and dialogue. That is what democracy is all about.

With that in mind, I want to request you to apply your own discretion under Standing Order No. 120 on all the Bills that come here even if they are Government Bills.You can probably waive the pre-publication period for us to be different from the First Senate that had very few Bills passed and became Acts of Parliament. I would like to request that you consider invoking your powers under Standing Order No. 120 on the Bills that have been already presented instead of taking too much time. That might help us achieve progress in this House.

I would like to support.

Thank you Mr. Speaker, Sir. I rise to support the Motion on the nomination of the House Business Committee, for the House to start running. I have listened to various speakers before me. I want to reiterate the issues of constitutionalism and rights. It is important for all of us to know that rights come with responsibilities. You

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir, for giving me this opportunity to contribute to the Motion that is before us. First of all, I want to thank God for allowing us to be back to the Second Session in this House. It was a very long recess; we are back and ready to work for this nation called Kenya. Therefore, I want to thank all of us. We have had a very long time refreshing, reflecting and looking at the way forward.

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Mr. Speaker, Sir, allow me first to welcome all Senators to Nairobi. Welcome back from your various counties. Officially, as a host Senator together with my other colleagues from the cities of Kisumu and Mombasa – we are only three from cities - we welcome you back to Nairobi. We look forward to the work that we will do in this Session of the Senate.

Mr. Speaker, Sir, I associate myself with many of the remarks that have been made by fellow Senators with respect to our outlook towards this Session. First of all, I

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir. I rise pursuant to Standing Order No. 98 (1) on closure of debates, which, with your indulgence, I would like to read.

It provides that:- “After the question on a Motion the Mover of which has a right of reply has been proposed, a Senator rising in his or her place may claim to move “That the Mover be now called upon to reply.” Mr. Speaker, Sir, I rise to seek that the Mover be called upon to reply, reason being that we need to close this debate to enable the said Committee to proceed and plan for the business for tomorrow and those other days.

Hon. Senators, I will put the question forthwith. (Question, that the Mover be now called upon to

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Sir. I can see the enthusiasm that the Senators have in so far as debating very important matters of the Senate are concerned. It is important that this Committee retreats right now to prepare the business for tomorrow, to enable the many Senators who would have wished to continue to contribute to do so.

I want to thank Senators for their intelligent contributions. I have noted with a lot of humility the difference in terms of tone, particularly, from the Senate Minority Leader and his Deputy, Sen. Orengo; Sen. Mutula Kilonzo Jnr. and Senator for Kisii, Sen. (Prof.) Ongeri who have had good contributions. Particularly, they castigated the political scenarios that we have in the country. I am so happy that this is coming from them because they have the key to stop what they call political madness, if I may quote them.

As Senators, we are the engine of political operations in many of our political parties. We must now come back to our senses and focus on the business that matters in this country. We have business to run and want our economy to grow. We do not want an economy that is full of protestors. We do not want to misuse young people for purposes of just calling them for rallies. It is now time to sit down and work on the creation of jobs.

Mr. Speaker, Sir, if this Senate and the Senators want to be respected, they must demonstrate that they respect the Constitution and constitutional offices. It must not be heard from the Floor of this House that there is a Senator who does not recognize that there is a democratically elected President. If that happens, in all our counties some characters that we defeated will declare and swear themselves to be Senators. We will be in a circus when we should be sitting down, working on how to make this Senate a strong House as my colleague talked about. That call, duty and desire to make the Senate a strong institution must be demonstrated in the manner in which we respect the Constitution of the Republic of Kenya.

What is your point of order, Sen. Outa?

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, Sir. With due respect to the Senate Majority Leader, could he tell this House who the ”characters” are? Is that language that can bring harmony to this House? The language he is using is derogative. Could he kindly apologize, if he really wants us to treat this House as the ‘Upper House,’ where people can reason together? The direction he is heading to, he is calling hell to fall on us.

Mr. Speaker, Sir, I insist that I am only following in the footsteps of Sen. Orengo, Sen. (Prof.) Ongeri, Sen. Wetangula and Sen. Mutula Kilonzo Jnr. who spoke passionately about the desire to strengthen this House and stop what they called political madness. Sen. (Prof.) Ongeri was even more categorical that as an elder he cannot just sit and watch people run a charade out there.

If there are characters out there who do not recognize the Senate and the constitutional offices, it must not include a Senator who is elected to represent the people of Kenya in this House. I insist that the collective respect of the Senate of the Republic of Kenya, depends on the behavior, manner and conduct of the individual Senators in this

February 13, 2018 SENATEDEBATES

Hon. Senators, the House has just approved Members to serve in the Senate Business Committee (SBC) . At the rise of the House, the Committee will proceed for its first sitting in the Second Session. So, all Members of the Committee are, hereby, invited to this meeting to be held in Committee Room No.4 at

Hon. Senators, the Senate, therefore, stands adjourned until Wednesday, 14th February, 2018 at 2.30 p.m.

The Senate rose at 4.25 p.m.