We need law to regulate political party funding – ACC

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ACC

We need law to regulate political party funding – ACC

By Fanny Kalonda

ANTI-CORRUPTION Commission director general Tom Shamakamba has stressed the need for the country to enact a law to regulate political party funding.

He says there must be a limit on how much funding must be and the source of where that money is coming from.

Shamakamba also stressed the need to strengthen laws that govern the declaration of assets for public persons and state offices so that there is transparency and accountability in the lifestyles of such individuals.

“We need to put an act in place which should regulate political funding. And there must be a limit on how much funding must be and there was be declaration of the source where that money is coming from. Because if you are just going to receive money from anywhere, tomorrow you can even receive money…” he said. “So there must be declaration of source of funding and equally there must be a limit because again if you have too much money, you can destabilise the economy. You can destabilise the security of the country, and normally you know politics with money is very dynamic. People can buy their way in. So I think the major issue is we need a law that should regulate political funding.”

Shamakamba noted with interest the calls for lifestyle audits for public officers.

“The commission notes with interest calls for lifestyle audits especially for public officers. In order to make these audits practical, we need to strengthen the laws that govern declaration of assets for public persons that are appointed into public and state offices so that there is transparency and accountability in the lifestyles of such individuals,” said Shamakamba.

Transparency International Chapter president Sampa Kalungu noted that politicians “grow short legs” whenever the issue of declaration of assets is mentioned.

He noted that both the current and previous governments would not smile about bringing the law to compel them to declare assets and source of funding.

“Here in Zambia, since the time of president [Levy] Mwanawasa up to today, this is an area where you see political parties agreeing on one thing. They grow very slow legs when you mention the word declaration of anything. The current government, the previous government, they won’t smile to bring about the law,” he noted. “Director General you need to do a lot canvassing for that law to come into effect because our ….is very agreeable most of the times to preventing such a law to come into effect for various reasons.”

Kalungu said there is need for all Zambians to push for such a law.

“So this is a big fact and we know it that when monies come, the people receive the money, when they are in power they tend to favour those that gave them money and this has continued for a long time,” said Kalungu.

“So for this and such a campaign, it should not only remain with the Anti-Corruption Commission, Transparency International Zambia, but we should actually rally Zambians to push our political parties, all political parties – like I am saying they are so reluctant to bring up this law. If you were to test it among our parliamentarians, how many of those are going to agree? But as we know also parliamentarians only might decide what they want to do unless their leaders of political parties decide what to do. So this is an appeal Director General, bring about such a law in Zambia.”

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