The Role of Political Parties in Enhancing Democratic Governance in Africa: a Case of Kenya
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Date
2018Author
Kirwa, Kipruto R A
Type
ThesisLanguage
enMetadata
Show full item recordAbstract
World over, political parties have been seen as vehicles for democratic governance and the mirror of positive impact within themselves. In Africa, they have failed to meet the threshold due to a number of limitations including the fact that they are founded on the narrow agenda of ethnicity, factions and regional coalitions. Even though there are states that have promoted some semblance of democratic governance within the parties themselves as well as presence of competitiveness among the political players, there is still a yawning gap between what it ought to be and the reality of the day. The study therefore sought to determine the role of political parties in enhancing democratic governance in Africa highlighting the Kenyan Context by examining the contributions and challenges encountered by political parties in enhancing democratic governance in Africa, the performance and challenge of the structures and frameworks of political parties and the factors which promote the role of political parties in enhancing democratic governance in Kenya. Descriptive survey was used and the target population comprised Members of Parliament from the 47 Counties, Party Officials, Internal Political Party Dispute Tribunals from 6 main political parties and key informants from the IEBC, the Office of the Registrar of Political Parties and Political Party Dispute Tribunal. Simple and Stratified Random sampling techniques were used with data being collected using structured and non-structured questionnaires as well as interview schedules. Quantitative Data was analyzed using SPSS Version 12 and presented in descriptive and inferential statistics. Qualitative Data was analyzed using thematic analysis and presented through narratives and themes. From the results, the role of political parties in enhancing democratic governance in Africa though crucial is a complex matter that needs the intervention of all the states and non-state institutions to work together towards a common purpose. Evidently, information from the research affirms that citizen participation in political party activities is not only important but critical in facilitating democratic governance. An imperative to democratic governance is inclusion of the party members and supporters in party nominations and selection of party candidates in order to engender fairness and collective ownership of the party institutions. In conclusion, the existing structures and frameworks of political parties and factors that promote the role of political parties in enhancing democratic governance augment each other at best if they are allowed to operate in an environment of freedom, respect of human rights and effective resourcing both in terms of human and financial resources. The study therefore recommends that there should be clear delineation between the party leadership and the management of state affairs in order to maintain some level of checks and balance between those leading the parties and individuals in government as a way of maintaining separation of powers and avoiding confusion. This will also assist curb compromise or collusion at the expense of transparency, fair play, justice and equity. Parties should be better resourced from state resources without discrimination and in this case, it is suggested that a threshold figure of 2% of all the votes cast should be a factor of political party access to such public funds. While the existence of the legal framework of various institutions of democratic governance such as Office of the Registrar of political parties, IEBC, PPDT and the Judiciary is a step in the right direction, it is incumbent upon the powers that be, elected leaders and the public to engage in productive dialogue on how to resource, strengthen engagement among the institutions and allow them to operate without uncalled for interference. The destiny of Africa lies therein.
Publisher
university of nairobi
Subject
Enhancing Democratic GovernanceRights
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United StatesUsage Rights
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/Collections
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