New elections bill protects offenders from being struck off the voters register

A bill that introduces new rules for future elections is set to be tabled in the National Assembly.

The proposed law introduces a fresh process of dealing with electoral offences, imposes a requirement for a degree for anyone seeking to be elected a member of Parliament and a diploma for those seeking to be members of county assembly (MCA).

On electoral offences, it eliminates the previous scenario where the High Court ruling on an election petition, would make a report on a criminal matter and refer it to the speaker of either House of Parliament for publication in the Kenya Gazette.

The new provisions remove the possibility of an electoral offender's name being deleted from the voters' register upon gazettement by the speaker.

Under the proposed law, an election court shall at the conclusion of hearing a petition, send to the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) and the commission a report indicating whether an offence is likely to have occurred in the poll. The DPP, upon investigation, can either open or close the case.

"Upon receipt of the report, the DPP shall direct investigations to be carried out by the Inspector General of Police and the National Police Service. Based on the outcome of the investigations, commence or close the matter," reads the Elections Law (Amendment) (No 3) Bill 2015.

If passed in its current form, the bill will lock out current MPs and MCAs without degrees and diplomas respectively. Nominated MCAs will also be subjected to the diploma requirement.

It also states a civil servant wishing to contest must resign a year to the election. This means that politicians who were recently appointed to the Cabinet, and wish to run for political office must vacate office in the next six months.

Although this requirement was opposed by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), the National Assembly Justice and Legal Affairs committee included it in the final version of the document.

Yesterday, IEBC Chairman Issack Hassan said although the commission was comfortable with the previous six-month requirement, MPs felt otherwise and decided to change it to one year.

It also requires political parties to submit party rules and lists to IEBC six months and 90 days before the elections respectively.