Civil society rejects attempts to undermine the Political Party Funding Act
21 January 2022
As Parliament begins to reopen and we approach the deadline for the third set of political party funding disclosures to be published, we are deeply concerned by political party attempts to undermine or repeal the ground-breaking Political Party Funding Act (PPFA). These attempts are not in the interest of the people. They are attempts to weaken our democracy and to allow our politics to be further beholden to private interests.
Most recently, the ANC’s leadership recommended that the party lobby other parties represented in Parliament to support plans to amend the Act. The ruling party wants to expand the annual threshold for disclosure from R100,000 to R250,000 or R500,000. If successful, this will mean that only donations above R250,000 or R500,000 in a year will need to be disclosed. This is despite the Zondo Commission showing how influence can be bought with as little as R100,000 and below. They also want the upper-limit a single donor can donate to a party per year to be increased from R15 million to R50m – R100m, or just be scrapped entirely! This would allow private capital to wield an absurd amount of influence over parties.
Further, they want the Act to exclude dividends and investments of political parties. Thus, donations from investment arms such as Chancellor House (which donated R15m to the ANC in the previous quarter) will not need to be disclosed. This will create further opportunities for secrecy and nefarious influence in our politics.
These thresholds are the lifeblood of the legislation and to remove it is to repeal the law.