Editorial | Disclose the money

There are two things in which the island’s major political parties are engaged at this time of which Jamaicans are certain, one of which is transparent. The other is opaque.

The governing Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and the People’s National Party (PNP) are openly campaigning for a general election that is yet to be announced, but which Prime Minister Andrew Holness must call by early September.

What is hazy is the parties’ fund-raising during the official “campaign period”, which started on March 7 and runs until whenever Jamaicans cast their ballots.

Yet, in this period, the parties can, between them, raise, and spend, up to $3.15 billion. That doesn’t include any money they might have been pulled in prior to the campaign period, including amounts used to finance their operations throughout the year.

Voters don’t know, unless donors identify themselves, who finances the campaigns, or generally funds political parties.

This opens the possibility of deep-pocketed people, and other special interests, using their resources to gain a lock on public policy, thus bequeathing to voters the best democracy their money can buy.

It is unlikely that any suggestion for change will get much traction with the parties in the midst of the hustings. However, the question of greater transparency in campaign/political party financing should be of urgency for democracy campaigners, and ought to be pursued with vigour now, and in the post-election period.

It ought, also, to be a matter of priority for the Electoral Commission of Jamaica (ECJ), which should not only leverage its prestige and authority to advance the issue. The ECJ should also use all legal tools available to it to enhance voters’ access to all information about the functioning of the parties, including access to their financial accounts.

PUBLICLY ACCESSIBLE REGISTER

Under Jamaica’s election campaign financing law, the campaign period begins “ the day following the last of the period 54 months from the commencement of the term of office of the government”. Which means six months before the term of a government officially ends, unless the prime minister calls an election earlier.

During that period a political party is allowed to spend (and presumably raise) up to $630 million on its campaign. Thus, combined, the JLP and the PNP could spend $1.26 billion.

Separately, each candidate can spend up to $15 million on her or his campaign, meaning that a party’s 63 candidates, if it contests, can spend, in total, J$945million. That translates – presuming the two parties’ candidates were able to maximise their fund-raising, and eschewed financial support from the central organisation – to $1.89 billion, combined.

However, while donations of $250,000 or more (funders may give up to $31.5 million to a party and $1.5 million to an individual candidate) have to be reported to the ECJ, the information remains secret with the Commission. So, too, do filings by donors who received government contracts worth $500,000 and above, in the two-year period before and after they have made their donations.

Except for a few occasions when a handful of donors voluntarily revealed their contributions to parties, the bankrollers of elections aren’t known to voters. Nor are voters aware of big donors who keep parties afloat outside of election periods. Or how much money parties have in their kitties.

Yet, registered political parties must, by law, make annual filings to the ECJ, that include the names of their leaders and officers, as well as audited financial statements. However, these accounts were not among the obligatory information that must be in a publicly accessible register of parties, kept by the ECJ.

The law, though, allows for the register to also contain such other “information as may be prescribed”. Insofar as this newspaper is aware, it has not been prescribed that parties’ financial accounts be added to the register, or otherwise made public. That must happen.

Moreover, the parties, even before the election, should voluntarily publish their accounts, as the PNP did a dozen years ago. It soon retreated from this act of transparency.

Further, while the law mandates that the register of parties must be available for public inspection at the ECJ’s offices, it also stipulates that it “shall be available for inspection on a website maintained by the ECJ”.

On this score, the ECJ cannot claim to be doing a good job on the website bit of its obligation. At least, in this newspaper’s view, it has not fulfilled the spirit of the law.

The ECJ’s website does list four registered parties, and has, in soft copy, various forms parties must complete to apply for registration and to file reports.

However, unless the Commission has some other secret or hard-to-find site, the available information on the parties on the existing site is, to say the least, extremely sparse.

That’s not good for transparency.