Sirisia MP John Waluke was on Tuesday, November 26, 2024, compelled to withdraw a statement he made criticizing members of parliament for the standing ovation on President William Ruto when he announced the cancellation of the Adani deals on Thursday, November 21, 2024.
Waluke, while acknowledging that Ruto took over leadership of the country when the economy had gone down and the loans had reached the ceiling, observed that MPs were out of order for implying their support for the president.
“This issue of members of parliament clapping like school children, even me, I don’t like it. When the president passes something or rejects, as members, there is a way of clapping and not just standing up and misbehaving like children,” Waluke remarked.
Finance Bill 2024
He stated that MPs on multiple occasions had gone against the will and wishes of Kenyans and had been put to shame when Ruto declined to ascent to the Finance Bill 2024 despite its bulldozing through the National Assembly amid public outcry.
Waluke also noted that the MPs were also being unruly by registering their delight when the president severed ties and deals with the Indian conglomerate Adani Holdings following an indictment in the United States.
“Would like the member of parliament to withdraw ‘misbehave like schoolchildren’ because it is too generalized and too stereotyping. Our schoolchildren do not behave badly. To say that they are behaving like schoolchildren is an insult to all the schoolchildren in this country,” Nairobi MP Esther Passaris interjected.
Longstanding tradition
On his part, Emuhaya MP Omboko Milemba equally castigated Waluke, noting that the tradition of standing ovations was practised worldwide
“The tradition of rising in the event a speaker has touched the souls of people and spoken on something that is touchy, exciting and overwhelmingly magnanimous for the country, is allowed. Members of parliament are being misconstrued for having risen up; that was very well in order,” Milemba said.
“I have withdrawn and I apologise to the members,” Waluke said.
Waluke who is serving his third term as Sirisia MP was first elected on an ODM ticket in 2013 before defecting and running on a Jubilee Party ticket and winning the consecutive general elections of 2017 and 2022.
He is the Bungoma County Jubilee party chairperson and the only elected Jubilee party member in the county.