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{
    "id": 470696,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/470696/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 208,
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    "content": "Province, it cannot be a political party. We were saying that a political party must be a party that has membership across the country because that is the meaning of a political party. It persuades and mobilizes people and resources for the national good and not for the good of a particular region. In fact, certain countries have serious problems on this issue. If you go to Germany, for example, there is a Bavarian Party. Bavarians are a proud people in the centre of Germany that are also very rich. They are hardworking people; the best industries are there, they make the best BMW model of cars and also brew a lot of beer which gives them a lot of money. So, Bavarians are also very nationalistic. In fact, they do not sometimes consider themselves to be Germans; they say they are Bavarians. They have a political party; the UDU which is only found in Bavaria. Now, we were trying to break away from that. We were saying that even if a party was as big as the Bavarian Party, it will not be a political party within the meaning of our constitution because we want a party that will cut across the whole country. In fact, the UDU has always been in a coalition with other parties to form Government or to form the official Opposition. They cannot themselves form a Government. It is strong and rich, but it is provincial. So, the intention of the legislature at the time we were making the Constitution and at the time we were making the Bill, was to create political parties that go across the country. You cannot be a party that says that you have a membership across the whole country when you only have one MCA in Kwale or in my village. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, first of all, the law was open; create as many parties as you wish but make sure that after the first election if you do not get 5 per cent of the votes, then you wither. First of all, you will just wither by attrition. The intention was to create a few strong parties, probably three or four and not more than five. They were supposed to be very strong parties that go across the country to deal with certain things that we have in this country. First, the intention of the law was to deal with tribalism, because somehow all our tribes seemed to live in certain areas which they call theirs. A political party cannot be a tribal party however big or rich. We were trying to cure a serious problem in Kenya. If we now go backwards and say, any party so long as it has an MCA in--- for example, mine is Igembe Ward - then I am entitled to political party funding, then I will go and form a party today and then make sure that I am the MCA and make sure that my party is paid a lot of money from the taxpayer and I become a millionaire. Secondly, it will encourage people to form hundreds of parties just to make money from the Exchequer. That was the mischief we were dealing with. We were dealing with a mischief in which people will start political parties to make money from the Exchequer. I can tell you that we have 3,000 plus wards in this country and so we might very well get 3,000 plus parties. Where will the Exchequer get the money to fund 3,000 plus parties? In fact, they will rob the serious political parties of the entire budget so that the meaning that we put behind this law will completely be defeated. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}