I just got back from a week in Kenya and another week in Rwanda/Uganda. I can talk about how awesome that was if you want, but the point of this diary is to talk about how Kenya is adopting what I think is a more American system of election practices for 2012.
Kenya seems to want to finally get rid of its culture of corruption with some reforms that would go into place for the first time in next year's elections. The new constitution states that these new regulations must be enacted by 8/26 this year, and while there has been some delay in getting them finalized people think that the deadline will be met.
Some of the new regulations that would hold true for the 2012 elections if the bill is enacted:
- the president can no longer appoint judges unanimously
- the president's ministers must be approved by Parliament
- the president must win at least 25% of the vote from each province in Kenya, and the provinces must be split up fairly by an independent board to ensure that they are not all one ethnic tribe
- the independent elections committee would include nine members who serve 6 year terms, and the committee would replace the ineffective previous board that was blamed for the 07/08 post-election riots
I picked up some of this info online and some from the local paper (the Daily Nation, I believe), so while I think I've done a decent job of fact-checking it all it might not be perfect.
Not sure who all of the candidates are - I know President Kibaki is not running for another term and that Odinga plans to run for president and resign as prime minster. There are also 2 MPs who are currently planning on running.