The National Assembly has rejected the proposal on the amount of money that candidates in the 2022 general elections should spent in their campaigns.
During the Tuesday sitting, the MPs in one voice voted against the guidelines following recommendations by the Committee on Delegated Legislation chaired by Tiaty lawmaker, William Kamket.
The proposal had been submitted by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission.
“This House adopts the Report of the Committee on Delegated Legislation on its consideration of the Draft Election Campaign Financing Regulations, submitted by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries and annuls in entirety,” the report read.
According to a report by the Delegated Legislation committee, the guidelines failed to meet the required statutory and constitutional threshold.
Article 88 (4) of the constitution states that IEBC is in charge of regulating the amount of money that may be spent by or on behalf of a candidate or a party however the committee said that IEBC can only do so in accordance to the constitution.
The committee further said that the electoral body filed the regulations late. The commission is required to make rules regulating elections financing 12 months before the general elections.
The rules were presented to the assembly on August 5 and forwarded to the committee on the same day for review.
“On the contrary, IEBC submitted the draft regulations very late, which would not allow the committee time to consider them with the set time lines as per section 13 of the Statutory Instruments Act 2013,” the report read.
IEBC’s proposal states that, political parties and aspirants would be required to open specific bank accounts for campaign cash, which would be closely monitored.
“A political party, candidate or any of the authorized persons shall open a bank account in a Kenya financial Institution for the sole purpose of the political parties’ elections campaigns or the candidate’s electoral campaign or referendum campaign,” the proposal reads.
RELATED STORY: IEBC Prepares Kenyans On Mass Voter Registration Set To Last 30 Days
