Senate petition seeks to bar repeat nominations and limit MCAs to one term
Petitioners argue that repeated nominations undermine affirmative action, deny opportunities to women, youth and persons with disabilities, and turn.
Senate Speaker Amason Kingi. (Photo: Senate)
A petition seeking to limit nominated Members of County Assemblies (MCAs) to a single term has been tabled before the Senate, with the petitioners arguing that repeated nominations defeat the constitutional goal of affirmative action.
Speaking in the Senate on Wednesday, Speaker Amason Jeffah Kingi said he had received the petition from Mr Laban Omusundi and others under Standing Order 236. The petition seeks a legal framework restricting all nominated MCAs to one term.
The petitioners argue that nomination slots were created to promote the inclusion of women, youth, persons with disabilities and other marginalised groups, not to repeatedly benefit the same individuals.
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“The re-nomination of nominated members of county assemblies amounts to a deliberate subversion of the Constitution intended to convert nomination slots into a closed system of political reward and patronage,” the petitioners said.
They further argued that “the continued recycling of the same individual through nomination illegally converts public positions into personal property locks out thousands of deserving Kenyans including youth, women and persons with disabilities, defeats the very purpose of affirmative action and erodes public confidence in democratic institutions.”
The petitioners said Article 56 of the Constitution requires the State to establish affirmative action programmes to expand political representation for minorities and marginalised groups. They added that party-list nominations were meant to “correct historical exclusion and expand representation, not to entrench privilege.”
They warned that the absence of a statutory term limit has allowed a small group of individuals to repeatedly occupy positions meant to broaden representation.
“The absence of a statutory term limit for nominated MCAs has created a dangerous legislative vacuum being exploited to capture and privatise constitutional opportunities,” they said.
The petitioners want the Senate to enact a law imposing a strict one-term limit for all nominated MCAs, without exceptions or transitional loopholes.
Speaker Kingi referred the petition to the Senate Standing Committee on Justice, Legal Affairs and Human Rights, which has 60 calendar days to table its report before the House.