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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