Nominated MP David Ole Sankok has triggered backlash after setting out strict and controversial views on which women should qualify for nomination under the gender top-up debate.
In a Facebook video posted on his timeline on Monday, Sankok said women with children from different men had failed what he called an integrity test and should not be nominated. He also said women seeking nomination should be married, and that those with children should have them fathered by one man.
He further argued that representation should be divided to reflect rural areas at 30 percent, women with disabilities at 30 percent and youth at 30 percent. The remaining 10 percent, he said, should go to Nairobi “loiterers and massagers (sic).”
During the National Assembly debate on the two-thirds gender rule, Sankok said he supported the proposal if the slots went to “our daughters, sisters, wives and mothers,” but said he had reservations if they were used by “slay queens” to enter Parliament, the Senate or county assemblies.
He also said women who deserved nomination and were married should make their husbands known. In the video, he added: “If you are not married and you have several kids from different quarters, you are not a woman of integrity.”
Sankok went on to say that unmarried women with children should present them for DNA testing to establish whether they had the same father. He said that if the children were fathered by different men, the woman would not have passed his integrity test.
The remarks came as Parliament continued to grapple with the Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill, 2018, which seeks to ensure at least one-third of MPs in the next House are women. The bill requires support from at least 233 MPs.
Some lawmakers have already expressed reservations, saying nominations are being used by party leaders to pick “slay queens and girlfriends.”
In March last year, Justice John Mativo ruled that anyone can write to the Chief Justice to advise President Uhuru Kenyatta to dissolve Parliament if MPs fail to enact the legislation. Kiminini MP Chris Wamalwa also told colleagues this week that the House risks dissolution if it does not vote for the gender rule.
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