Calls for firm measures to police political party funding

An independent entity must be established to police compliance with the Political Party Funding Act.

This is according to some political parties that are opposing a bid by the NGO – My Vote Counts – which is seeking an overhaul of the Political Party Funding Act that compels political parties to fully disclose all donations they receive.

According to the Act, political parties must disclose donations above R100 000, whilst the maximum they can receive from donors is R15-million.

Those opposing the application include the Democratic Alliance, ActionSA, the Minister of Home Affairs and Justice as well as Parliament.

This time the NGO -My Vote Counts wants independent candidates and political parties alike to disclose all donations regardless of the amount – even if it is just one rand.

The DA, which received large donations as revealed by the IEC’s disclosure report for the 2024/25 financial year, has proposed that a structure be established to monitor the compliance and non-compliance of political parties when it comes to declaring donations they receive.

The party’s representative on the IEC’s National Party Liaison Committee, Werner Horn says, “We are of the view that a sub entity of the IEC which can still be part of the framework of the entities that deal with our elections can then be tasked with those investigations. It’s not the IEC per say, but if you for example look at the possibility of entrusting one of the commissioners to head a unit that then ultimately deals with those complaints, similar to how the NPA is set up.”

“It’s now become a permanent feature of our legislative framework, the investigative directorate in its own structure and architecture to deal with corruption. It’s still part of the NPA but it has limited scope and focus. So that ultimately in our view is another way in which we can enable a proper investigation of complaints that not everybody discloses as they should.”

If the court rules in favour of My Vote Counts, ActionSA says it will be a threat to the multi-party democracy.

It says the focus should not be on changing the legislation but rather on strengthening compliance with it.

Among its proposals is that the IEC must have access to the bank accounts of political parties.

ActionSA’s Chairperson Michael Beaumont says, “That is why, we have gone into this process, proposing our own amendments that we think should be tabled in respect to the political funding legislation that gives the IEC real teeth to gain access to the bank accounts of political parties. That allows for proper accountability that is fundamentally missing right now.”

My Vote Counts insists in its arguments that the Political Party Funding Act in its current form is not meeting its constitutional goals of accountability, openness and transparency, pointing out many loopholes.

MVC’s Money in Politics Lead, Joel Bregman says, “So there are several pressures ones, ones about related entities are that it’s an obvious loophole in the law that for example, if I’m a wealthy individual I can entirely, legally set up 100 different companies through them I can donate the maximum R15 million a year.”

“Which is obviously against the spirit of the act, similarly, I can donate to those 100 companies R99 000 and no one can know my identity. Because it’ll fall under the disclosure threshold. So, we are saying that the law needs to take into account related parties’ entities to cover those sorts of issues,” adds Bregman.

Arguments will continue in the Western Cape High Court on Wednesday.