Kenya: Mps Collude to Extend Their Term
By Eric Sande
NAIROBI---The ambiguous language used in the new constitution is the scapegoat the current Kenyan parliamentarians are using to seek to extend their stay in office.
“Most of them have got loans and mortgages to pay. They earn over a million plus shillings a month ($12,444). So, any sensible person will say why would I surrender the million shillings plus when there is a loophole I can exploit to make sure I earn that money?” said Okia Omtata, the executive director of Kenyans for Democracy and Justice.
The law makers with the supported by Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister Mutula Kilonzo and the leaders of key parliamentary committees responsible for implementation of the new constitution, argue that the current Parliament is protected from the proposed legislative calendar and must serve out its full term to December 2012, five years after it was elected.
A group of law markers argued that Parliament can extend its term to February 2013, five years after the current House was inaugurated.
Speaking to representatives of political parties, Kilonzo said that the clause in the new constitution setting the second Tuesday of August every fifth year could only apply to the 2017 general election.
The move has raised eyebrows with lots of criticism from a section of lawyers, civil society groups, religious leaders as well as politicians saying the lawmakers are undermining the new measure.
Paul Muite, a former Kikuyu MP, said the new constitution set a fixed calendar for the life of the legislative term, and stripped the president of powers to dissolve it at any time and influence the electoral calendar.
“The president no longer has the powers to set the election date, those powers rest with the constitution and it is on the second Tuesday of August after every five years,” argued Mr Muite, a Senior Counsel and former chairman of the Law Society of Kenya ( LSK).“So if you hold elections on a date other than the second Tuesday of August 2012, you will create a vacuum and a constitutional crisis because section 59 of the old constitution which gave the president powers to dissolve parliament is no longer in force,” he told the Nation.