On Thursday, 29 November, the Saeima adopted in the final reading amendments to the Law on Financing of Political Organisations (Parties), thus setting forth that as of next year political organisation (party) member’s total contributions in the form of admission fees, membership fees and gifts (donations) to one political organisation (party) may not exceed 50 minimum monthly salaries during a calendar year instead of the current limitation of 100 salaries.

The same regulation will also apply to natural persons. As of the next year a natural person’s total contributions in the form of gifts or donations to one political organisation (party) may not exceed 50 minimum monthly salaries during a calendar year instead of the current limitation in the amount of 100 salaries.

The gift (donation) will be considered accepted if the political organisation (party) has not returned it to the giver (donor) within 60 days from receipt of the gift (donation). Currently the period for making this decision is 30 days.

The Law was amended because as of 1 January 2012, political parties are entitled to financing from the state budget and also because it is necessary to reduce the influence of private financing on the activity of political parties.

The amendments will also specify the procedure according to which the Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau should request information about the legitimacy of the income of the natural person making a contribution to a political party. The amendments will also entitle the person to request that the deadline for providing such information be postponed if there are objective reasons for doing that.

If contributions in the form of admission fees, membership fees and gifts (donations) fail to meet the requirements of the Law, the relevant financial resources should be transferred to the state budget, and the relevant property should be handed over to the state.

The new wording of the Law sets forth that the Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau will have 45 days instead of the currently stipulated 30 days for preliminary verification of information regarding received gifts (donations), because verification of documents and gathering of information from various state information systems is a labour-intensive process.

In order to streamline the regulation on financing political parties from the state budget, the amendments set forth that financing from the state budget will also be available for political parties that are formed after the general election as a result of a merger of two or more political parties that previously received financing from the state budget.

The amendments will reduce election campaign expenditures by half; thus, political parties before general and local government elections will be allowed to spend an amount that does not exceed the average gross monthly salary of the year before the last year multiplied by the number of voters that participated in the previous general election and by the coefficient of 0.0004. Currently this coefficient is 0.0008. In the case of an extraordinary general election, this coefficient will be reduced from 0.0004 to 0.0003.   Amendments to the Law on Financing of Political Organisations (Parties) will take effect on 1 January 2013.


Saeima Press Service