Corporate Communication Unit.
Lion Place Nairobi, Kenya; February11 , 2021
Secretary Generals (SGs) of various political parties converged for a two-day engagement forum on 10th and 11th February 2021 at the Crowne Plaza, Nairobi to receive guidance on varied compliance matters. The meeting was convened by Office of Registrar of Political Parties (ORPP) with support of International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA).
During the meeting, attendees were taken through a host of requirements for compliance and apprised of their compliance status as spelt out in the Political Parties Act, 2011 and Political Parties (Registration) Regulations, 2019. The forum also gave an opportunity for the political parties to raise and deliberate on challenges encountered in adhering with applicable codes.
Registrar of Political Parties Ann Nderitu (standing front, right) makes her remarks during the compliance meeting held on 10th and 11th February 2021, in Nairobi.
In her remarks, the Registrar noted that the forum was one of the ORPP’s strive to strengthen political parties. She reiterated the Office’s commitment in laying modalities for political parties to be well governed institutions able to serve the interests of Kenyans. “We encourage political parties to entrench good governance in all processes in order to foster democracy in Kenya”. Ms. Nderitu said. The Registrar also reproved of the indiscipline cases amongst political parties. “In the recent past, party members are increasingly becoming non-loyal to their parties, I want to make it clear that ORPP stands for loyalty to political parties to avoid confusion to Kenyans”, guided the Registrar.
The Office monitors compliance of political parties using compliance tools such as statutory forms and checklist that specifies various compliance areas as enshrined in the Act. These tools help political parties outline and submit within specified timelines compliance information to the ORPP.
Assistant Registrar in charge of Compliance, Regulation, Political Parties Fund and Capacity Building, Mr. Ali Surraw, while speaking during the session, commended the fully complaint political parties despite the hurdles experienced such as funding. “To be in good legal standing, those parties that are not compliant must demonstrate effort to remedy non-compliant issues as guided by ORPP from time to time “, Ali said.
Assistant Registrar of Political Parties Ali Surraw speaking during the compliance meeting
Political parties’ representatives present expressed their gratitude to ORPP and IDEA for organizing such a productive forum. They too applauded the ORPP’s continued effort in regulating parties such as on-going efforts to make public the party membership register through the E-citizen platform. They proposed for consideration of continual embracing of technology in tandem with modern times “We may need new interventions to some of the challenges the parties are facing. For instance, consideration of political parties to have virtual offices, especially in this digital era, where most of the services can be provided on online platforms”, posed Omondi K’yoo of the National Liberal Party.
The meeting brought together more than 40 SGs from different fully registered political parties. Currently, there are 72 fully registered political parties with the latest entrant, National Reconstruction Alliance (NRA) attainment of full registration status in February, 2021.