Clean Politics For Better Governance
This was the first project for the Coalition. The project's goal was to contribute to the promotion of stable, vibrant and accountable political parties in Kenya. Its purpose was to promote ethical and transparent mobilization and utilization of financial resources by political parties in the country. The projects purpose was realized by accomplishing the following objectives:
- pushing for the establishment and implementation of an effective legal framework for the management and financing of political parties;
- sensitising key governance stakeholders and the public in general on the problem of corrupt political party financing and educating them about solutions;
- creating programmatic synergy among civil society organizations (CSOs) working on political (party) financing and anti-corruptions issues.
The project employed two major approaches in the political parties' regulation, management and financing: first, legal interventions where it entailed the publication of the Political Parties Bill 2007 by the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Affairs, the intervention by Parliament and various stakeholders and subsequent enactment of the Bill into law. The second approach was, revelations of incidences of political financing which included; coordinating the efforts of civil society organizations, mainstreaming political party finance issues in the media, sensitising political parties on the problem of corrupt political party financing and building their capacity to engage in transparent and accountable fund raising and expenditure and sensitising the public on the political financing and educating them on solutions.
Achievement Summary of the Project:
So far CAPF has achieved the following:
CAPF successfully pushed for the enactment of the Political Parties Bill 2007 which the Parliament passed in October 2007 to be law. This was a big step towards reforming political party regulation, management and financing in the country.
It documented incidences of corrupt political party financing during elections. CAPF had three interim reports and the final report which highlighted different/many incidences of abuse and misuse of state resources for campaign purposes and corrupt campaign finance practices by political parties during the 2007 General Elections.
Through the project, CAPF enhanced co-ordination and partnership building among civil society organizations working on political financing and anti-corruption issues.
CAPF raised awareness to the public on the problem of corrupt political and unregulated campaign finance practices. This was extensively covered by the print and electronic media including newspaper articles, television talk shows, radical news headlines, radio talk shows featured political party campaign finance issues between October 2007 and April 2008.
It has extensively built the capacity of its members on political party finance issues and party finance monitoring through organizational capacity of civil societies.
