National Assembly Speaker Justin Muturi has clarified why the BBI report cant be tabled in parliament at the moment, after some leaders expressed concern with his initial statement during the weekend. The Speaker had earlier pointed out that the report can only be implemented through a referendum, adding more fuel to a political discussion that is already heating up.
However, speaking on Monday, Muturi said there is currently no mechanism to table the report in parliament. “There are some propositions that could lead to suggestions to amend the current constitution but again we haven’t reached there, this is still just a report, it’s still embryonic,” he said. He said the report is still just made of proposals , which can’t be classified as legislation, yet Parliament is a place of legislation.
He noted that when the time comes, and there is the need to bring it through parliament then the necessary processes should be followed, “There are some areas which could end up as legislation but a lot of them are just proposals, policies, ethics….” He said the question should be why haven’t most of the proposals already been implemented since they are contained in the constitution.
The implementation of the report has laid the foundation for another political tussle with leaders allied to Deputy President William Ruto calling for a parliamentary implementation, while those allied to former Prime Minister Raila Odinga calling for a the public’s involvement, a referendum.