Victor Bwire/HANDOUT
We are it once again. The unending attempts to cleanse our elections campaigns by way of dealing voter bribery, money laundering through elections and creating some playing ground for aspirants in general elections. A very desirable and timely move which require the support all and sundry, the huge expenses incurred in the campaign activities have made elections in Kenya a life and death affair. Bankruptcy, mental stress, financial and family mess and ostracization are always the next steps for election losers while the winners make the national and county assemblies business chambers to recover finances spent on the elections.
This is minus expenditure should the process take a legal way through election petition.
To ensure accountability in elections, management of political parties and campaign for political positions in Kenya, the IEBC has published draft guidelines to cap spending on campaigns by candidates, a second attempt, after the initial push in 2022 when it was rejected by MPs.
Whether as with other laws which gather dust on the shelves, this if passed will help increase transparency and reduce the cost of elective politics in the country, through its implementation is debatable.
The regulations under the Election Campaign Financing Act 2013 allow for regulated contributions to parties and candidates, this time at Sh 44 billion for presidential candidates and sh 17 billion for political parties, to form campaign finance committees, and to account for funds received during the electoral activities.
The maximum for governors, senators and woman rep. is the guidelines are accepted will vary from 12.3 million to 123 million determined by population and geographical coverage, while MCA candidates will be allowed between sh 2,5 million to sh 20 million. Hopefully this time, they will see light of the day and implementation done.
The issue of information disclosure on sources of funds, use of the funds, member involvement in party management affairs and accountability of the parties on the performance of their elected and nominated members must be looked at. The small issue of managing their primaries within time and within minimum acceptable standards in terms of respecting democratic processes is important. Nearly all political parties get their candidates through goons and criminal gangs, corruption, highly manipulated candidate selection processes and lack of respect for their own constitutions. In extreme cases, party candidates are selected through judicial processes.
The Electoral management body might also be required to seriously assist the management of primaries of many political parties ahead of the 2027 general election- as seen in many failed attempts to conduct their party elections, they are incapable of providing democratic space to their membership.
They lack transparency in choosing candidates, must be interested in holding to account or see the prosecution of office- bearers involved in election offences including messing with nomination lists and respecting of the two-gender rule.
In addition, past experiences showed that many of the political parties rarely keep and can disclose basic information such as members registers, contributions or use of funds.
Many parties use poor party nomination processes and often allow party “owners” or founders to hugely influence interferes with party electoral processes.
The rampant use and misuse of public resources including involvement of public officers in electoral processes must be re looked.
Given the current political extremism in the country, it will be suicidal to allow public officers to be directly involved in the electoral processes.
Electoral campaigns are not official government business hence there can never be any justification whatsoever for using public resources to conduct what is essentially unofficial and private business.
Already they are guidelines that require public officers interested in participating in elective politics to vacate offices six months before the campaign period commences and sections of the Public Officer Ethics Act prohibiting public officers from participating in partisan politics, this seems just a paper requirement- they seem not to be consequences for violating these requirements.
An earlier study released in 2022 by Prof. Karuti Kanyinga and Tom Mboya on behalf of South Consulting Africa Limited entitled “The cost of politics in Kenya” established that in the 2017 general election, senators spent Sh 49 million, women representative Sh 32.2 million, Member of Parliament Sh21.2 million and Member of County Assembly Sh 4.2 million to win the election and those losing spent Sh 20.3 million, Sh 13.4 million, Sh 14.9 million and Sh 2.1 million respectively. That tells you the money largely determines our elections.
The study established that the Senate seat is the most expensive of all the posts to contest for costing an average of Sh 35.5 million to contest for this seat in 2017. Contestants for the Woman Representative seats followed with an average expenditure of Sh 22.8 million Members of parliament averaged Sh 18.2 million while the Member of County Assembly seat was the least expensive at Sh 3.1 million).
These costs are predominantly raised from individual’s personal savings or with the support of friends or family. Less than 20% of survey respondents received financial support directly from their political party.
The more a candidate spends, the greater their chance of electoral victory.
Woman Rep candidates who won their race spent almost three times as much as those who were unsuccessful.
In addition to significant expenditure, the support of a dominant party enhances candidate’s chances significantly.
Implementation of the Elections Campaign Financing Act requires more accountability and focus to ensure that political parties develop policies, strategies and ideologies that are clearly discernible and distinct to assist citizens make decisions that shape their lives.
Proactive information disclosure by parties and where this does not
happen, media exposes on the activities of parties, manifestos, party
nominations, complaints handling procedures, gender sensitivities and related
will help citizens in participating in the election.
