Thursday, June 21, 2012

MPs betraying Kenya


MPs betraying Kenya
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Updated 2 hrs 44 mins ago
By Alex Ndegwa and Peter Opiyo
Members of Parliament worked late into the night rewriting electoral laws to subvert efforts to promote discipline in political parties and ensure only serious presidential contenders make it to the ballot.
They stamped a seal of approval for a series of amendments designed to facilitate party hopping as dozens of their colleagues face court cases for defections yet they have clung onto their parliamentary seats.
MPs without respect to party affiliations, suppressed the will of Kenyans as expressed in the 2010 referendum on the Constitution. They not only went against the spirit of laws Kenyans overwhelmingly voted for, but they also invaded the electoral laws they themselves passed to anchor the dream of Kenyans.
This included academic ceiling set for candidates seeking elective posts as well as the time within which public servants seeking elective office must have resigned before the General Election.
In the changes debated by the House and passed under the simple majority and acclamation rule last evening, MPs also handed a lifeline to presidential aspirants and their running mates by opening the door for them to contest for other elective seats or qualify for nomination to Parliament.
The reason the clauses were inserted in the first place was to discourage joyriders from running. 
They voted for the changes designed to help errant MPs find their way out of trouble with the law and also ease tough electoral requirements ahead of the March General Election.
Water down
They effected the changes to water down the Elections Act and Political Parties Act through amendments in the Statute Law  (Miscellaneous amendments) Bill, an Omnibus legislation that enables a review of multiple laws at ago.
The Elections Act restricted candidates for president and deputy president from seeking any other position, a provision that could have condemned losers to political oblivion.
Had the requirement been enforced, the crowded field of presidential hopefuls would have been whittled down with few unlikely to gamble.
The Bill passed late last evening after Chepalungu MP Isaac Ruto (ODM), who moved the amendment, defended it saying the law should not be applied to discourage competition for president or frustrate younger presidential hopefuls by “sending them to the village”.
“Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act and for the avoidance of doubt, a person who is nominated as a candidate for election as president or deputy president is nevertheless eligible for nomination and may contest as a candidate for any other elective seat in the same elections,” read the Ruto amendment.
Ruto further pushed the amendments to have the President and the Deputy President relinquish their other elective positions should they succeed in being elected in two positions, thereby occasioning unnecessary and costly by-elections.
In a Parliament where majority of members have renounced parties that sponsored them to the House, but won’t seek fresh mandate from the electorate, MPs shielded colleagues from losing their positions.
They voted to exempt members of the Tenth Parliament from a provision of the Elections Act prohibiting a person from being a member of two or more parties at the same time.
Errant MPs will also be spared the sanctions spelt out for members who participate or promote activities of parties other than those on whose ticket they were elected to Parliament.
The Elections Act provided that such MPs lose their parliamentary seats. Another requirement of the Act they shelved is the provision that any member found to have contravened their party constitution would be stripped of the seat.
“Until after the first General Election held after the commencement of this Act, nothing provided for in subsections (4), (5) or (7) of section 14 shall be construed as requiring a person to vacate his or her seat as a Member of Parliament or of a Local Authority, or as disqualifying any person from eligibility to contest in an election under this Act,” read the amendment by Gachoka MP, Mutava Musyimi.
MPs are openly associating with new parties, which are not considered parliamentary parties, including Eldoret North MP’s United Republican Party, and Deputy Prime Minister Musalia Mudavadi’s United Democratic Forum.
They also relaxed stringent electoral timelines that were designed to curb last-minute defections by losers in party nominations.
An amendment that reduced the time for a political party to submit its nomination rules to the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission from six to three months before the nomination of its candidates eased the blockade.
Academic Credentials
The MPs approved the raft of amendments designed to smoothen their path ahead of the elections contrary to a constitutional provision that bars members from conferring benefits on themselves.
The lawmakers also voted to exempt sitting MPs and councillors from high academic credentials spelt out in law should they defend their positions in the General Election.
Public servants intending to contest in the elections were also allowed to stay longer in office than had earlier been permitted in the initial Act. MPs passed the amendment that public officials resign five months to the elections rather than seven months as earlier stipulated.
And the MPs made the by-elections possible before the General Election, as they voted to allow the Speaker of the National Assembly to declare the parliamentary seats vacant and give IEBC the green light to conduct elections.
The Speaker could not declare any seat vacant as the powers to issue writs had been suspended until after the General Election.
This has seen the declaration of vacancy in Kangema Constituency delayed following the death of former Environment Minister John Michuki in February.
The country would also need to elect MPs in Ndhiwa and Kajiado North following the deaths of Assistant minister Orwa Ojode and Internal Security Minister George Saitoti.
On Wednesday, the Commission for the Implementation of the Constitution said it would go to court over the blatant breach of the Constitution by MPs who have personal interests in the amendments.
Prime Minister Raila Odinga, while speaking from Russia where he is on official visit, also rejected the amendments, describing them as an “assault on the will of the people who endorsed the new Constitution” through a referendum.
Separately, Garsen MP Danson Mungatana defended the provision in the Elections Act that gives an opportunity to losers in the Presidential or Deputy Presidential elections to be nominated as MPs.
Mungatana said the provision would ensure the opposition is strengthened in Parliament to provide effective checks and balances on the Executive even as questions are raised over the manner the Act was corrected by the Attorney General.

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