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Kenya: House Slides Into Chaos Over Move to Review Parties’ Law

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4 years ago

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Nairobi — Chaos and confusion rocked the commencement of the debate on the second reading of the Political Parties Amendment Bill 2021 as members engaged in a shouting match for the better part of the opening session on Wednesday.

The high voltage debate pitting Deputy President William Ruto’s allies and those in President Uhuru Kenyatta and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga’s camp started on the wrong footing with those opposed to the Bill protested the move to rush the amendments.

Tharaka MP George Murugara sparked fury after he alleged that the House Justice and Legal Affairs Committee (JLAC) which conducted public participation on the Bill failed to conclusively and satisfactorily conduct the exercise.

Murugara is also a member of the committee and a close ally of Deputy President.

“We did not schedule this meeting to discuss this Bill,” he said as he also raised concerns on the unconstitutionality of some of the clauses contained in the Bill.

Dagoretti South MP John Kiarie aggravated the matter when he alleged that the Committee never adopted its report and led his colleagues in chanting demanding that minutes of the meeting be produced before the House.

“This is a House of records and there is no consideration of memos that came in and we cannot say that we have done conclusive public participation on the Bill,” he said.

JLAC Committee Muturi Kigano however dismissed the allegations and revealed to the House that all procedural legal requirements were followed.

“We followed the procedure and the report was adopted by the committee members and in fact member Murugara sent his message of apologies but never registered any issues concerning the report,” he said.