ghts Development (CEMIRIDE) & 2 others v Attorney General & 2 others; Independent Electoral and BoundariesCommission (Interested d) if a member has been expelled from a party, e) if political parties have merged, f) if there are other events to justify a change in the register. 122. It was explained that in the event of a dispute, the aggrieved political party may submit the matter to the Political Parties Tribunal established under Section 39 of the Act for determination. Further, Section 34C of the Act requires that political parties intending to conduct party nomination shall acquire the certified party register for this purpose which certified party register contains the relevant information of every party member regardless of how he/she registered to be a member. Accordingly, it is the totality of both the party membership list submitted to the 2nd Respondent by the political parties and the data of the persons who directly registered on the IPPMS platform. He asserted that any attempt to deploy a register not certified by the 2nd Respondent for the purpose of party nominations is contrary to the law and is a recipe for anarchy. It was therefore his view that since the law must be applied as it is, the Petition constitute an attempt to circumvent the provisions of the Political Parties (Amendment) Act, 2022 particularly with respect to political party nominations. 123. The deponent averred that if this court was to bar the 2nd Respondent from using the digital register for the purpose of party nominations, the effect will be that there will be no political parties’ membership register recognised by law for the purpose of party nominations and this is in view of the fact that verification and certification of the political membership lists, which is a requirement of law, can only occur through IPPMS. The Court was therefore urged to consider that certain legal timelines that will culminate in the General Elections to be held on the 9th August 2022 Elections have been triggered including:a) political parties to submit their party membership list to the 2nd Respondent on or before 26th March 2022. b) the 2nd Respondent to verify and certify the party membership lists within 7 days of submission, c) party nominations to be concluded by 22nd April 2022, d) intraparty nomination disputes to be concluded by 22nd April 2022. 124. It was therefore averred that it will be impracticable to meet the above timelines if this court restrains the 2nd respondent from deploying the digital party register for the purpose of party nominations and that from the above explanation it is clear that the Petitioners have failed to appreciate the concept, deployment, use and function of the digital register on two fronts; a) The interface between the digital register and the IPPMS b) The existence of other alternatives to the IPPMS registration. 125. The 2nd Respondent, in its submissions relied on Articles 38(1), 91(1)(a), Sections 4A(a), 7(2)(a) and (b) of the Political Parties Act and it was submitted that Political parties must therefore ensure that the processes used in recruiting members, meets the Constitutional threshold under Articles 91(1)(e), and 27 of the Constitution and that they are precluded from discriminating against any persons including marginalized groups and minority communities. However, the role of the 2nd Respondent within the framework of the political party membership registration is to verify and certify the membership list provided by the various political parties under Section 34 of the Political Parties Act which sets out the functions of the 2nd Respondent under Section 34 of the Political Parties Act. 126. According to the 2nd Respondent, in ensuring compliance with the Political Parties Act, the 2nd Respondent is under obligation to verify whether a person wishing to join a political party meets the requirement specified in Sections 3(2A) and 34(f) of the Political Parties Act that the person must be an adult Kenyan citizen who does not belong to another political party. 127. In its submissions, the 2nd Respondent reiterated the foregoing and added that Section 34B of the Political Parties Act commands the 2nd Respondent to establish political parties’ management information system for the purpose processing political parties data and records for the purposes of the Act. The purpose of this system, according to the 2nd Respondent, is to inter alia http://www.kenyalaw.org - Page 15/29