By ALPHONCE SHIUNDU
Kenya: Four months ago, Eldas lawmaker Adan Keynan planned to publish changes to the law to allow every Kenyan to fly the national flag on their cars.
The MP has, however, changed his mind and now proposes a maximum fine of Sh1 million or a jail term of up to five years for those who do so.
The proposed fine is 500 times the current maximum fine of Sh2,000. The jail-term is 30 times the current proposed time of just two months.
Mr Keynan has drafted the amendment in such a way that anyone can be sued, convicted and sent to jail, just for flying the flag, including county governors. He wants the flying of flags on official vehicles be reserved for the President, the Deputy-President, the Chief Justice, the Speaker of the National Assembly and the Speaker of the Senate.
The National Flag, Emblems and Names (Flying of the National Flag and Displaying of Armorial Ensigns) Regulations, had also proposed that members of Cabinet (Ministers and the Attorney-General) fly flags.
Mr Keynan told The Standard On Saturday that he wanted the Speaker of the Senate included in the list of those to fly flags on their vehicles. But he wants to exclude the Attorney General and Cabinet Secretaries.
“The idea of prescribing who should fly the flag and who should not must be handled in the substantive Act of Parliament, not in subsidiary legislation,” Mr Keynan said in an interview. “These things are being dished out left, right and centre, and can be withdrawn on the whims of an individual.”
The heads of 47 county governments fly the national flag on their vehicles. There has been controversy over why the issue and the Attorney General, Prof Githu Muigai, had told them that it was illegal for them to fly the flags. There is another pending amendment in the Upper House, the Senate, seeking to have governors only fly the national flag on their vehicles as long as the vehicles remain within their respective counties.
When he first thought of the amendment, this is what Mr Keynan had said: “I’d really want the Speaker of the Senate to fly the flag; I’d also want some of the other (State officers of) key institutions to fly the flag. I’d also want the issue of flying the flag to be an inherent right of every Kenyan citizen as long as you use it in a proper and diginified way.” That was four months ago. He said the issue of flags just perpetuated “the big man syndrome” and made some of the key national events to be equated to a certain political class.
But after watching the governors and hearing the views that his colleagues had about the conduct of their respective governors, the MP agreed to just focus on the Speaker of the Senate.
The MPs, both in the National Assembly and in the Senate, want the governors to be the bosses just within their counties, and not all over the country.
A member of the Parliamentary Committee on Administration and National Security, Mr David Gikaria, had during debate on July 11, told his colleagues that without a law, the confusion was likely to stay. “I think the noble thing… is to … put up some legislation that can… give us direction,” said Mr Gikaria.
Mr Nicholas Gumbo (Rarieda) added: “The main reason why Kenyans clamoured for the repealing of the Constitution that we had was to try to bring down the powers of the imperial presidency. However, we are devolving the imperial presidency to the counties.”
The Rarieda MP backed the amendments to the law.
When Parliament returns on September 17 to a light calendar, Mr Keynan’s Bill will likely top of the list of those that will be ready for debate.
