Focus on amending Constitution will not bring gender parity

Anyone who was expecting the National Assembly to pass the Constitutional Amendment Bill this week must exist in an alternative reality. The Bill was a cruel joke on women. I surmise its intention being merely to report to Court and Chief Justice, when need arose, that Parliament was working hard to achieve Justice Mativo's orders earlier this year for Parliament to enact the required legislation within 60 days or face dissolution. The clearest evidence of dis-ingenuity was the constitutionally defective approach that Parliament took. The Constitution required Parliament to pass legislation, under the existing Constitution, to ensure that no gender was unfairly under-represented. It would be a constitutional absurdity to say that the Constitution could only be complied with by amending it; this would no longer be compliance of the existing Constitution!

But even more critically, any proposals that sought to respond to the gender question by adding nominated MPs when there is already a feeling that Kenyans are over-represented would meet the wrath of a long-suffering public. Never mind that the increase to the exchequer would be relatively negligible; this is a matter on which the public is generally averse to. This is why in numerous meetings on the issue after the Supreme Court's decision, it was agreed that while it was a difficult issue to resolve, a constitutional amendment in the proposed terms was not the prudent way to go.