M. Campaign Financing

Article 65(20) of the draft law retains the current provision that “the balance of non-spent funds on a special account shall be returned to a candidate, political party”. This article does not specify any limitation on how a candidate or political party is to use these returned funds. Allowing a candidate to retain unspent campaign funds for personal use could have a corrupting effect. In fact, allowing candidates to use unspent campaign funds for personal use could be seen as a form of bribery. The Venice Commission and the OSCE/ODIHR previously recommended that this provision be amended to prohibit the use of unspent campaign funds for the personal benefit of candidates. Unspent campaign funds could be returned to donors on a proportionate basis, given to charities, or required to be used for some other legitimate public purpose. The recommendation remains unaddressed.