Political parties face a two-third gender rule headache
The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has advised all political parties to guarantee that the two-third gender standard is followed in their nominations for the 290 constituencies not more than 193 can be of the same gender.
According to IEBC Chairman Wafula Chebukati, in an event a political party presents a list of 47 candidates for county based positions for members of Senate, not more than 31 candidates can be of the same gender.
“You are hereby reminded that all political parties participating in the August 2022 general election must comply with existing statutory obligations and ensure all list of the nominated candidates for the 290-constituency based elective positions for MPs and 47 County based positions for members of the Senate must comply with the two-third gender rule,” he stated.
The commission will, however, give the impacted political party 48 hours to modify the list and resubmit it to the commission.
“In the event a nomination list doesn’t comply with the two-thirds gender requirement, the Commission will reject the list and communicate in writing to the political party, then provide the party with an opportunity to revise the list and submit the revised list within 48 hours of receipt of communication from the commission,” he said.
IEBC says a revised list that doesn’t comply will be rejected in totality and all candidates in the list will not be eligible to contest in the election.
