The Parliament

The Parliament
According to Wikipidea:

The unicameral National Assembly of Kenya is the country’s legislative body. The current National Assembly has a total of 224 members. 210 members are directly elected in single member constituencies using the simple majority (or First-past-the-post) system. 12 members are appointed and two members (the Speaker and Attorney-general) are ex-officio.

I would like to bring your attention to the word unicameral :~

Unicameralism is the practice of having only one legislative or parliamentary chamber. Many countries with unicameral legislatures are often small and homogeneous unitary states and consider an upper house or second chamber unnecessary.

Having a one parliamentary chamber is no longer enough to hold Kenya as one nation due to the fact that, for the past 46 years the National Assembly has not represented the interests of the Mwanainchi at all levels of government. Kenyans love peace but that peace is no longer guaranteed as long us we have one chamber parliament consisting of members who have no interest of Mwanainchi at their portfolios.

Their is no doubt that Kenya is a tribal country and in that sense, split in many places along tribal lines. We need to strength our ethnicity without prejudices for several reasons

• We cannot get rid of our origins and culture
• Our ethnicity makes who we are
• Our Customs have been with us for centuries, it is in our blood to protect our ethnicity.

In order for Mwanainchi to have an accountable representation in government and for his/her ethnicity protected and presented in the Laws and institutions of the Land, we need a two chamber Parliament.

One chamber should be a lower house with  short  term representatives and the other house upper house with long term Senators. All the members of the upper house, the senate, should be directly elected by the electorate. Where as the Lower house, House of  Representative should contain 90% or 95% directly elected members by the electorate.

House of Representative

• At least 2 representative of each ethnic group nominated or elected (whichever is best)
• Each district should receive representaion in the House in proportion to its population but is entitled to at least one Representative.
• There should be a maximum number of Representative set from each Province to the House.
• Each representative should serve a two or three year term.
• The house should have a presiding Officer i.e the Speaker and elected by the members of the house.
• The house should have its own exclusive powers  such as to impeach officials and elect the President in an election deadlock.
• All bills for raising Revenue should originate in the House of Representatives

The Senate

• Advise and must consent to the President’s government appointments;
• Ratify all treaties with foreign governments
• Tries all impeachments
• Each district should elect a Senior and a Junior senator for representation in the Upper House. The two senators must never be elected at the same election and their election must fall on the election day of the House of Representatives.
• All senators must serve six years continuous term.

Both houses of Parliament may introduce bills except as restricted above.

I believe the two chambers format would certainly bring respect, responsibilities, accountability and more professionalism into our Parliament.

• The Executive