Homa Bay Town MP Peter Kaluma is pushing for the changes through the Children (Amendment) Bill 2019, saying single magistrates are inexperienced in family matters.
Mr Kaluma said only those magistrates who are married and have the experience to handle family matters should hear cases involving children.
Magistrates who are not married will be locked out of cases involving children if the National Assembly adopts a legislative proposal.
Homa Bay Town MP Peter Kaluma, who has himself battled a protracted child support case, is pushing for the changes through the Children (Amendment) Bill 2019, saying single magistrates are inexperienced in family matters.
Appearing before the National Assembly Labour and Social welfare Committee Thursday to defend his amendments, Mr Kaluma said only those magistrates who are married and have the experience to handle family matters should hear cases involving children.
“We need people who are mature and have run families, people who are settled and know that every decision they make can destroy the life of a child completely,” he said.
Mr Kaluma, however, said due to the low number of magistrates, if unmarried magistrates should preside over the children cases, then they should be of the senior cadre. The lawmaker expressed concern that low-cadre magistrates preside over the majority of children cases, making unpopular orders that not only work against the interest of the child but also end up affecting the child’s future.
“Some of these weird orders on child custody are issued by these single magistrates who just [recently] graduated from the law school,” Mr Kaluma said.
He cited a case in January where a 10-year-old girl shocked a Mwingi court when she broke into tears soon after the magistrate ruled in favour of her mother in a child custody case.
The girl wailed in an apparent protest against the court's decision to transfer her from her father's care.
The committee yesterday adopted Mr Kaluma’s proposals, which will now proceed to publish it into a Bill.
Mr Kaluma also wants the children ActNo. 8 of 2001 to be amended to vest equal responsibility for parental care and protection of a child in both the mother and the father whether they are married or not.
“The Bill provides that neither the father nor the mother of the child shall have a superior right or claim against the other in the exercise of such parental responsibility,” reads the Bill.
“The Bill amends section 24 of the principal Act to make it mandatory for the father and mother of a child born to have parental responsibility of the child whether the parents were married at the time the child was being born or did not subsequently get married.”
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