POLITICAL PARTIES

CHAPTER 2:07
POLITICAL PARTIES

ARRANGEMENT OF SECTIONS

    SECTION

PART I
PRELIMINARY

    1.    Short title

    2.    Interpretation

PART II
GENERAL PRINCIPLES

    3.    General principles

PART III
THE OFFICE OF THE REGISTRAR

    4.    Establishment of the office of the Registrar

    5.    Appointment of the Registrar

    6.    Powers, functions and duties of the Registrar

    7.    Independence of the Registrar

    8.    Tenure of office of the Registrar

    9.    Funds for the office of the Registrar

    10.    Accounts

PART IV
REGISTRATION AND DEREGISTRATION OF POLITICAL PARTIES

    11.    Register

    12.    Application for registration of a political party

    12A.    Party manifesto to align to national development agenda

    13.    Certificate of registration and its effect

    14.    Refusal to register

    15.    Review of refusal to register

    16.    Deregistration

    17.    Review of decision to deregister

    18.    Notice of change in registered particulars

    19.    Failure to notify changes

    20.    Refusal to register amendments

PART V
FINANCES OF POLITICAL PARTIES

    21.    Entitlement to State funding

    22.    Uses of State funding

    23.    Banking, accounts and audit in respect of State funding

    24.    Suspension of State funding

    25.    Closure of books and records of account upon dissolution of Parliament

    26.    Power of Minister responsible for finance to give financial instructions

    27.    Private funding and receipt of donations

    28.    Separate bank account for private funding

    29.    Registration and declaration of assets

    30.    Auditing of private financing

    31.    Members’ access to financial records

PART VI
RIGHTS AND DUTIES OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN ELECTIONS

    32.    Right to participate in elections

    33.    Freedom of assembly

    34.    Freedom of expression

PART VII
MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS

    35.    Inspection by the Registrar

    36.    Access to information received by the Registrar

    37.    Onus of proof

    38.    False information, obstruction, etc., of the Registrar

    39.    Unauthorized distribution of inexact version of a political party constitution

    40.    Use of threats and violence against donors

    41.    Prohibition of handouts

    42.    Prohibition of multiple membership to political parties

    43.    General penalty

    44.    Regulations

PART VIII
REPEAL, SAVINGS AND TRANSITIONAL PROVISIONS

    45.    Repeal and savings

    46.    Status of political parties already registered

    47.    Saving of existing rights, powers, etc.

    48.    Compliance with this Act

        SCHEDULE

1 of 2018
1 of 2022
G.N. 82/2018

    An Act to make provision for regulating the registration, financing and functioning of political parties; and to provide for matters incidental thereto and connected therewith.

PART I
PRELIMINARY

1.    Short title

    This Act may be cited as the Political Parties Act.

2.    Interpretation

    In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires—

    “campaign material” means a political party’s or candidate’s manifesto, advertisement, billboard, posters, t-shirts, clothes, or other materials depicting colors regarding symbols and other designs of a political party or pictorial images of a candidate and includes materials that may be published as campaign materials and these include; a manifesto, advertisement, billboard, poster, booklet, pamphlet, leaflet, magazine, newspaper, t-shirt, clothes or other materials depicting a color, symbol, picture or other design for a political party or a candidate;

    “candidate” means a person nominated to contest in a presidential, parliamentary or local government election, and includes an independent candidate as defined under the Presidential, Parliamentary and Local Government Elections Act;

    “handouts” means transactions whereby political parties, bodies, candidates or any other person distribute private goods, cash, gifts and other items to a person as an enticement to vote for the political party or the candidate that shall not include matters or transactions specified in the Schedule;

    “member” means a person eligible to vote under any written law and whose name, address and signature are entered in a register of members kept and maintained by that political party, but shall not include a mere sympathizer, follower or supporter of a political party whose name is not entered into the party’s register;

    “Minister” means the Minister, for the time being, responsible for justice;

    “office bearer” includes a leader of a political party;

    “political party” means a combination of persons who have constituted themselves for a political purpose and are registered as such under this Act; and

    “Registrar” means the Registrar of Political Parties appointed under section 5.

PART II
GENERAL PRINCIPLES

3.    General principles

    (1) The following principles shall, at all times, be adhered to in the implementation and application of this Act—

    (a)    respect, by political parties in conducting their affairs, of fundamental principles and rights enshrined in the Constitution;

    (b)    freedom by all persons to form a political party and to cease to be a member of a political party, and no person shall be compelled to…