Focus on stability

 THE proposed constitutional amendments and the revised Organic Law on the Integrity of Political Parties and Candidates are to maintain and strengthen political stability, Registrar of Political Parties Dr Alphonse Gelu said. 

He was referring to the proposed amendment to Section 145 disclosed in the media yesterday. 

They are to be tabled in Parliament at its next sitting.

He said when his team, comprising legal and political experts from various organisations, made the proposed amendments especially to Section 145, they took into consideration the country’s political development. 

“We looked at how Governments have changed in the past through votes of no confidence and saw how MPs became so obsessed with moving motions of no confidence without any proper justifications and how Governments spent their time looking for numbers and less time on delivering services to the people,” he said.

“We also realised how much political instability has affected the abilities of the Governments to plan for long-term strategies and implement these strategies. Based on these factors and realities the team then framed the proposed amendments.”

Gelu said all political parties were given equal opportunity through the ballot box to win seats and the party that won the majority of the seats was the party that majority of the people mandated to form the Government.

“It is the people who gave their approval for the Government to be in power. To remove the Government from power it must be the people that would do that through the mandate that they have given their representatives to make.”

“The proposed amendment would give the party invited to form the Government after an election the first opportunity to nominate a person within the party to be Prime Minister.”