The Registrar of Political Parties Anne Nderitu has opposed a push by President William Ruto’s United Democratic Alliance (UDA) party for the allocation of a further Sh115 million from the political parties fund.
The registrar’s office says the formula she used to distribute the political parties' funds was correct, and transparent and that UDA is not entitled to extra allocation.
In the formula, which UDA is challenging at the Political Parties Disputes Tribunal, the ruling party was given a share of Sh577 million from the Sh1.48 billion Political Parties Fund.
The gist of the legal contention between the Registrar and UDA is whether the ruling party deserves to be allocated funds for votes garnered in the Kericho Woman Representative and Ravine Ward Member of County Assembly elections, where the two UDA candidates were elected unopposed.
UDA says the Registrar failed to consider the said votes and as a result, it was deprived of its due share of the funds in excess of Sh115 million.
But in response, the office of the registrar says since there were no votes to be considered in terms of the Kericho County Woman Representative and Member of County Assembly Ravine Ward Baringo county as leaders in the two areas were elected unopposed on UDA ticket, there were no votes cast.
In the legal formula of sharing the fund, the registrar says she considers the votes garnered by each political party and the elective seats won by the party.
She adds that prior to the distribution of the funds there were various engagements with the qualifying political parties and the subject was the distribution of the fund including the formula and data on the distribution of the fund.
The entire kitty for the political parties in the 2022/23 financial year is Sh1,475,000,000 and is meant to be distributed to 48 political parties.
The top five beneficiaries of the fund include UDA, ODM, Jubilee, Wiper and DAP-K. Raila Odinga’s Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) got an allocation of Sh308 million followed by the Jubilee Party of former President Uhuru Kenyatta with an allocation of Sh135 million.
The amount given to Jubilee is a significant shrink from the previous financial years when it was the major beneficiary of the funds.
The then-ruling party used to pocket more than Sh500 million every financial year.
Wiper Democratic Movement of Kalonzo Musyoka will receive Sh72 million while Democratic Action Party – Kenya, associated with former Defence CS Eugene Wamalwa will get Sh31 million.
In an affidavit sworn by lawyer Joy Onyango, the office of the registrar want the tribunal to dismiss UDA's case.
The tribunal has since suspended the distribution of the fund pending a hearing of the dispute.
UDA through lawyer Adrian Kamotho Njenga, argues that the registrar miscalculated the total number of votes garnered by qualifying parties in the General Election held on August 9, 2022, in regard to the election of the President, MPs, Governors and MCAs.
Mr Njenga says that UDA has unlawfully deprived of funds in excess of Sh115 million that it is rightfully entitled to, hence jeopardizing its activities and operations.
“In arriving at the fund allocations, the Registrar totally disregarded the UDA’s unopposed votes in relation to the positions of Kericho County Women Representative and Member of County Assembly Ravine Ward, Baringo County,” says Mr Kamotho.
He adds that despite multiple requests and prodding, the Registrar failed to disclose to the UDA the formula employed in arriving at the said amount by indicating the treatment of votes secured by UDA visà-vis the total number of qualifying votes.
“The import of the Respondent’s decision is that the UDA shall be unlawfully deprived of funds in excess of Sh115 Million that it is rightfully entitled to, hence jeopardizing its activities and operations,” says Mr Njenga.
The case will be mentioned on November 30 before the tribunal chaired by Desma Nungo for a hearing.
