The Fair Play Alliance ethics watchdog has declared that audits of political parties financing needs a major reform.
"Nearly all political parties are unaware of the wording of the law and inspections cannot uncover such cases," said Fair Play Alliance head Zuzana Wienk. “The parliamentary finance committee, which controls the financing of the parties, fails too. The financing of parties is not the committee's priority and it makes political decisions."
The Fair Play Alliance suggests shifting party financing control to an independent body with sufficient powers and the freedom to act. It pointed two recent cases of alleged violations of the law on party financing, which concern Smer and the SDKÚ.
Fair Play argues that both parties accepted gifts in contradiction with the law and did not report them in their annual reports. Both parties rented offices from Bratislava’s Ružinov district at Sk250 per square meter annually, while the commercial rent in this area is at least ten times higher.
The law orders political parties to identify the difference between the below-market price and the commercial price as a gift. SITA
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
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