Monday, March 06, 2017

On the "campaign period"

electioneer v. gerund or present participle
(of a politician or political campaigner) take part actively and energetically in the activities of an election campaign.
The Elections Act (No. 11 of 2011), at section 2, defines "campaign period" as,
the period specified as such in the notice issued by the Commission in relation to an election
The notice referred to in section 2 is a notice published by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission under sections 14, 16, 17 and 19 of the Act, which have to do with the presidential election (s. 14), a parliamentary election (s. 16), a county governor election (s. 17) or a county assembly election (s. 19).

So far as I can tell, the Commission has not published a notice specifying the "campaign period" in relation to any election. What we are witnessing now are what would be called political campaigns and not election campaigns as defined by the Elections Act, 2011. A political campaigns is,
an organized effort which seeks to influence the decision making process within a specific group.
The two are often taken to one and the same thing because a political campaign in a democracy is
an organized effort which seeks to influence the decision making process within a specific group. In democracies, political campaigns often refers to electoral campaigns, by which representatives are chosen or referendums are decided.
But, in tribute to the British Westminster system that governed so much of our electoral history, "campaign period" has a specific legal meaning and until the Commission publishes its notice, the campaign period in Kenya has not officially commenced even though political campaigns never truly ended after the previous general elections.

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