National Electoral Commission (NEC) Director of Elections, Mr Kailima Kombwey
THE National Electoral Commission (NEC) has strongly refuted reports published in one of the Kiswahili daily newspapers on Thursday, that it was involved in advising Speaker of the National Assembly on how to address the matter surrounding the eight embattled Civic United Front (CUF) Special Seats Members of Parliament (MPs) and their replacements.
According to a statement issued late
yesterday evening by NEC and signed by its Director of Elections Kailima
Kombwey, the published report claimed that on June 26, this year, a
total of 12 lawyers from government entities met to advise the Speaker
on the matter.
Mr Kombwey said the newspaper reported
that the meeting to advise the Speaker was attended by lawyers from the
offices of Parliament, Attorney General, the NEC and Registrar of
Political Parties.
“NEC is deeply saddened by the published
report which is entirely false. NEC has never and will never be
involved in any meeting to advise the Speaker on how to perform his
duties, as per the country’s constitution, rules and regulations,” Mr
Kombwey said.
He added: “The national electoral body
would like to inform the public that the report published by the
newspaper that quoted CUF secretary about the meeting held is fabricated
and should be ignored.”
The Director of Election advised media
practitioners to ensure that any report published about NEC was correct.
Meanwhile, NEC has denied allegations circulating in social media,
accusing it of violating rules and regulations in nominating eight
Special Seats CUF legislators.
According to the statement issued by Mr
Kombwey, the reports posted in social media accused the national
electoral body of being a player in the CUF conflict by sabotaging the
opposition party.
According to NEC, the allegations in the
social media cited the resolutions reached by CUF’s national governing
council as having accused the national electoral body of breaking the
rules and regulations governing the nomination of Special Seats MPs.
In the resolutions, CUF accused NEC of
deliberately declining to follow the order of names in the list
submitted to it by the political party after the legislative polls as
the rules and regulations provided for.
In the resolution, CUF claimed that the
eight names of MPs announced by the national electoral body on Thursday
to replace the other eight legislators who were stripped of their party
membership by the faction led by CUF Chairman, Prof Ibrahim Lipumba
(pictured), were not in the list submitted. In its clarification, NEC
said it was saddened by the misleading claims from the party about the
duties of the national electoral body.
NEC explained that article 78 (1) of the
country’s Constitution clearly states that any political party that
participated in the general elections and gathered at least five per
cent of the total legislative votes qualified for special seats in the
House.
Mr Kombwey said Section 86 A of the
National Elections Act, Cap. 343 gives a political party the chance to
bring a list of women who can be nominated Special Seats MPs after the
election.
Quoting various sections of the National
Elections Act and Article 78 (4) of the Constitution, NEC had no
mandate to nominate Special Seats MPs without consulting political
parties but by sticking to the list submitted.
According to Mr Kombwey, political
parties are the ones that keep records of their active members and those
who are not, insisting that NEC drew names of the new CUF MPs from the
list of 55 members submitted to it on September 28, 2015 with reference
number CUF/AK/DSM/ KM/003/1A/2015/14, signed by CUF Secretary General.
On Thursday, NEC nominated new CUF MPs on Special Seats, replacing eight others who were stripped of their party membership.
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