Raila Scores Major Win in Parliament

Raila has won a major milestone in the national assembly after the speaker Justin Muturi sided with him on the route that the BBI report should take.

Reports from the Daily Nation on Monday, December 2, that the speaker of the National Assembly ruled out the possibility of the report being subjected to debate by the members and instead opted for it to be judged on the court of public opinion.

Speaking at a church fundraising meeting in Uriri constituency in Migori county where he had been hosted by area leaders, Muturi reiterated the idea that Kenyans needed to read the BBI report and decide on how to go about it from then on.

Speaker Justin Muturi stated on December 1, 2019, that he was in favour of the referendum to iron out issues in the BBI report.

"It has no way of coming to parliament. Let it be there with the people. You all know well that the report cannot be brought to the floor of the house before I approve, and I have said that it belongs to the people and it has no route to parliament," Muturi was quoted.

He insisted that his view was informed by the idea that the BBI report was a people-centered initiative that should be looked into by the citizens who were the biggest beneficiaries, and not the National Assembly.

His calls come less that a week after ODM leader Raila Odinga expressed his reservations with the MPs debating the report in the national assembly in fear that it could be sabotaged by the members of the national assembly.

His calls were echoed by the Dagoretti North Member of Parliament Simba Arati who had alleged that the DP had indeed hatched a plot to ensure that the jubilee majority in parliament shoot down the report.

To avoid this, the ODM party had sought the referendum route as the only chance for the bill to reflect the intentions that they had during its creation.

Senate majority leader Kipchumba Murkomen, however, speaking at the church in Bondo openly disagreed with the speaker, holding on to a view that only the contentious issues in the BBI be addressed by the public while the national assembly irons out the rest.

Murkomen and other DP Ruto's allies have strongly expressed their aversion to a referendum and are instead calling for the BBI issues to be sorted  out in the national assembly.

Senate Majority leader Kipchumba Murkomen on Sunday, December 1, insisted that the BBI report should be debated in the national assembly and the contentious issues be subjected to a referendum.