Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna has been asked by the Senate to withdraw his ‘kissing behind’ remark that he uttered on Wednesday during Health Cabinet Secretary Susan Nakhumicha’s grilling.
Nakhumicha had appeared before the Senate to respond to questions of the ongoing unrest in the health sector among issues.
Trouble began when Sifuna accused the senators of not asking direct questions to the health CS claiming they engaged her in unimportant issues.
“We are not here to worship the CS. we are not here to give stories. Mr Speaker have few minutes and this is a national debate. We are not here to kiss people’s behinds. Limit the senators’ questions and let them be direct.” Sifuna said.
This was however not received well by a number of senators who asked him to withdraw his statements with some accusing him of belittling women.
“Why should you allow him say we are kissing people’s behinds? Our kisses are for somewhere else Mr Speaker. He must withdraw that statement. Can you call him out of order.” Nandi Senator Samson Cherargei said while interjecting Sifuna.
“When a woman comes here, Sifuna starts to demean women leaders because what he is doing now is belittling women in this space. He needs to come here and apologize and withdraw. When you come here you can’t just be thinking of sexual preferences such as kissing women’s behinds. This is out of order. He must not only apologize to women present in the house but also apologize to women of Nairobi and Kenya” Nominated Senator Gloria Orwoba said.
The speaker was then forced to ask Sifuna to withdraw his remark in a bid to bring the house in order.
“Senator Sifuna, I would urge you to withdraw kissing whatever part of the body that you made so that we can move on.” the speaker said.
Sifuna however did not apologize as instructed by other members of the house, he only replaced it with another word.
“I have the full range of vocabulary, I will withdraw kissing someone’s behind and replace it with massaging the Cs for health because that is what senators are doing.” Sifuna said.
— Senate of Kenya (@Senate_KE) April 16, 2024