Prohibited

Section 157 of the Electoral Act prohibits funds allocated to a political party from being used directly or indirectly to pay any remuneration, fee, reward, perquisite or other benefit to any person representing the political party in Parliament, any regional councillor or local authority councillor who holds any other office of profit at any institution.

Furthermore, Article 140 of the Electoral Act instructs political parties to submit records and audited financial reports to the commission by the end of each financial year.

In terms of declarations of assets and liabilities, political parties are expected to conform to Article 139 of the Electoral Act.

However, most political parties have not been complying with the Act, and they have been accused of diverting taxpayer funds to pay off loans for some party leaders, buy family members cars and pay themselves second salaries, as well as adding associates to the party's payroll without clear terms of reference.

For instance, the IPC bought over a hundred vehicles that cost over N$50 million.

The silence from the IPC regarding where the funds originated from has been deafening.

Parties like Swapo have constructed offices to the tune of N$700 million. It is still not clear how this building was financed.

Meanwhile, the PDM is said to be paying its president McHenry Venaani a second salary with public money, in wanton disregard to the Electoral Act.

Over the past five FYs, political parties have received N$592 million from the Treasury.

Between 2015 and 2020, taxpayers gifted political parties a combined N$679.5 million.