Youth should be involved in party politics

The biggest casualty of poor democratisation in Kenya’s party politics are the youth.

Although a law was put in place in 2011 to guide the operations of party politics and guarantee participation of more youth, the manner in which the parties are socialised, structured, and how they operate does not guarantee this noble idea that the proponents of the Political Parties Act envisaged.

This view is supported by a new analysis by the Centre for Multiparty Democracy in Kenya, which indicates that political parties are not open to the concerns, interests, and involvement of young people despite their significance in the country’s electoral process.

Statistics show that any serious political party in Kenya should take the youth agenda as its core rallying platform if it hopes to transform governance in this country and ensure participation of the most populous electorate.

About 78 per cent of Kenyans are below 34 years old.

There are 5.9 million voters aged between 18 and 35 years.

This is the reason the law set out minimum requirements for political parties in regard to the rights and modes of youth participation.

There is no single political party in Kenya that can be cherished as democratic.

WEAKLY ORGANISED

With almost a quarter century history of multiparty politics in the country, the vital lessons on how the parties are supposed to be governed have not been learned and lamentably, there are no clear signs that things will get better in the foreseeable future.

Kenya’s political parties are weakly organised, numerous, lack strong discipline, and are tribal political vehicles to allow leaders of ethnically mobilised communities to negotiate a share in national politics.

All the populous communities in Kenya have at least formed a party or are aligned to a certain political affiliation.

There is no single party that can ride on a strong ideology such as that of rallying its support through such an important agenda as youth empowerment.

In almost all the political parties in Kenya, structures and practices relegate youth to mere voting machines.

It is for this reason that there is a general apathy among the youth in political participation.

According to a report by the Centre for Multiparty Democracy titled Youth in Political Party Participation in Kenya Baseline Study - 2015, there seems to be a disconnect between the youth and party politics, which could be aggravated by apathy.

PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION

Youth are relegated to lower and insignificant positions, such as youth leagues, with limited resources and authority to meaningfully influence party decisions.

The exclusion of youth in party politics clearly manifests itself in the national leadership.

Although various political parties purport to conduct fair nominations, the party leaders are keen to influence the outcome based on the candidates who can bring them the biggest political capital.

With their harsh history of marginalisation in all spheres of life, only a handful of young people are likely to take part in national leadership.

Most importantly, nomination of party list members should be based on proportional representation and the youth should have the biggest share, being the largest sector of the population.