Deadline this week for political parties to show us the money

30 June 2016

Friday 1 July marks a deadline for political parties to respond to demands for them to show the public who is funding them. This will mark 30 days since My Vote Counts (MVC) submitted Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA) requests to the 13 political parties represented in the national parliament.

This information is a crucial first step in demanding the transparency that the public deserves of politicians who are asking for votes in the upcoming 2016 local government elections.

On 31 May and 01 June 2016, My Vote Counts submitted Promotion of Access to Information Act(PAIA) forms to the 13 Political Parties currently represented in the national Parliament.

These PAIA forms requested the following information from the political parties:

A full record of all monetary donations received from private sources, including individual persons (local and foreign), companies (local and foreign), and foreign governments.

This information is requested for the past 5 years.

The record must specify -

- the date on which the funds were received;

- amount received;

- the name of the funder;

- and if there were/are any conditions to the donation – what these conditions are.

This information is vital for the South African electorate to make an informed decision in deciding on which political party they should vote for in the upcoming elections.

MVC has only received written responses from 2 political parties thus far and the deadline for all responses is 1 July 2016.

We hope that political parties will show some respect to the electorate that they are currently canvassing for votes from, and provide us with the information that we seek. The South African electorate has a right to know where the private funding of political parties comes from.

Issued by Janine Ogle, Coordinator, My Vote Counts, 30 June 2016