Election Law should prevent abuses in the campaign

Transparency International BiH urges the Inter-Agency Working Group for the Amendments to the Election Law to use the process of the amendments to the law so to strengthen the mechanisms for protection against the abuse of public funds, functions and institutions aimed at pre-election promotion and vote buying

Banja Luka, 22nd January 2016 – Transparency International Bosnia and Herzegovina (TI BiH) submitted to the Inter-Agency Working Group for the Amendments to the Election Law its proposals and recommendations for the improvement of the Election Law, related to the prevention of the public funds, functions and institutions abuses during the pre-election campaign, inappropriate pressure put on voters and vote buying realized through the employment, incentives and donations.
TI BiH performed monitoring of the election campaigns for the General Elections 2010 and 2014, during which it recorded numerous examples of using public institutions and companies, as well as the privileges related to the public functions, for the purpose of the pre-election promotion. These examples included the use of official vehicles and public personnel for the party meetings, use of institutions or public companies campaigns for party promotion, use of institutional premises for the preparation and implementation of pre-election activities, and use of institutional functions performed by the candidates in order to put certain pressure on voters.This leads to an unequal position of candidates and parties in the elections, but it also enables direct abuse of public resources for personal needs of candidates and parties. Therefore, TI BiH emphasizes that it is necessary to clearly and precisely define forbidden forms of the behaviour of candidates who perform public functions and to prescribe their behaviour from the date of the elections announcement until the election day.
TI BiH proposed the introduction of a prohibition on paid advertising of state, entity and local government organs, public companies, institutions and funds which may, by any means, favour political subjects during the election campaign, as well as a prohibition on the use of premises of public organs and companies for the preparation and implementation of the campaign activities. One of the proposals is related to the limitations regarding budget spending, in a way that it must not be significantly higher than the average during the pre-election period, while at the same time it must ensure greater transparency of public expenditures in the given period. It is also necessary to impose restrictions on the employment in public administration, public companies and funds, in order to prevent vote buying through the employment.
It was proposed to introduce clear rules on the prohibition of the use of official vehicles, helicopter and other services for the purpose of election campaign activities (attending election meetings etc.) and detailed distinction between public and party functions, i.e. appearance of the officials acting as public functionaries or candidates in the elections, through the limitation of their public appearance for the purpose of the pre-election promotion or through the introduction of a pause in performing high public functions during the official pre-election campaign, since it has been definitely subordinated to the election activities.
TI BiH also pointed out the need to more precisely define provisions referring to the prohibition of the vote buying and putting pressure on voters, in a way to prohibit every form of providing gifts in the form of money or goods, or just to make some benefits potentially possible, monetary or in the form of the employment, appointment, promotion and similar, in return for a vote for a certain candidate or a party. The necessity of amending these provisions can be seen in the increasingly frequent practice of the candidates and the parties to give money or food to the voters, to promise to employ them, in order to ensure their votes, which can certainly be defined as vote buying. In the same way it is necessary to define and prohibit pressure put over the employees in the institutions, threats and ultimatums, aimed at collecting votes on the basis of the influence or position of the candidate in the public institution.
Finally, recommendations also referred to the introduction of supervision over the property records and increase of monetary fines for violation of the provisions of the Election Law, since the existing ones are not proportional to the profit political subjects may generate by violating law.
TI BiH appealed to the members of the Inter-Agency Working Group to use the opportunity which has been given to them to improve the Election Law, and to include the public and civil society in the process of discussions and drafting.

Press rls – 22 1 2016 doc eng