ECJ pushing for changes to political party financing

BY ALICIA DUNKLEY Senior staff reporter dunkleya@jamaicaobserver.com

Thursday, September 02, 2010

THE Electoral Commission of Jamaica (ECJ) is pushing for several changes that could affect way political parties handle funds, including campaign financing.

"We have brought certain changes to boundaries and the electoral process, now we are bringing it to finance," Chairman of the Electoral Commission of Jamaica Professor Errol Miller told journalists at a press briefing at the commission's office on Red Hills Road in St Andrew yesterday.

The recommendations are contained in one of three reports submitted to Parliament in July.

"For the first time in our laws we are requiring all political parties to be registered with the Electoral Commission of Jamaica and we will keep a registry of political parties," Professor Miller said, noting that the requirements to be registered are minimal.

He, however, said that there is a higher set of requirements for parties that qualify for state funding.

"To qualify for state funding you must receive at least five per cent of the votes in an islandwide election or correspondingly you must get 50,000 signatures," he noted.

"The significant features of the new proposed legislation is that political parties must all have constitutions, they must hold annual general meetings, they must select their officers annually, they must submit to their members an annual budget and after that first year they must submit to their members annual audited reports of their financial operations," Professor Miller added.

In addition, he said all funds donated to political parties will be treated as trust funds — meaning they can only be used for the purposes for which they were donated and those monies must be lodged in bank accounts of the party. The commission will have access to those funds.

On the matter of contributions for amounts above $100,000, the party receiving the money and the person making the contribution will have to report independently to the commission.

In the meantime, statutory bodies are prohibited from making contributions and their operations will be monitored by the commission. Professor Miller said if from its own information the commission is of the view that statutory bodies are making specific projects that are timed to the holding of elections, action would be taken.

And on the matter of campaign financing he said the requirement will now be for political parties to identify and name to the commission everyone who is a councillor, member of Parliament, councillor/caretaker, constituency caretaker, and constituency chair.

"They must report all that they spend in the constituency for the entire year and if somebody comes up new they have to retroactively account for what they have done," Professor Miller told journalists.

"It plugs an important hole in the existing regulations because we have regulations on campaign financing but one of the major holes in the existing legislation is that a person only becomes a candidate on nomination day and is held accountable for expenditure up to election day (minimum 16 days and maximum 23 days between election day and nomination day. No account is therefore taken of any monies the person spends prior to nomination," he explained.

"We are now going to embark on the issue of amending the campaign financing regulations. Sections 55 to 61 of the Representation of the People Act, we are going to be inviting anybody, any organisation in Jamaica with ideas on this issue of campaign financing to make submissions to the Commission and we will also seek to have dialogue with bodies that contribute to political parties, private bodies, the trade unions among others," he said.

The commission expects to complete this exercise by December.

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COMMENTS (1)

N Manley Blythe
9/2/2010

ECJ, It is excellent to see you putting new measures in place. These will serve our country well towards eliminating corruption re party financing.
The glaring issue of non publication of donors is still of grave concern. It is pointless to deem ourselves a democratic society if you ask us to trust you to monitor donors. Transparency is a must. That, is democratical.
Your reason "grave concerns" is unfounded, and serves only to facilitate backwardness. The advancement of democracy must continue!

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ECJ pushing for changes to political party financing