Electoral Court fines parties for failing to provide audited financial statements to IEC
The Electoral Court has ordered a number of political parties, including the ANC, to pay administrative penalties for failing to provide audited financial statements to the Electoral Commission of South Africa.
They did not oppose the case or file papers at the Electoral Court to explain why they had failed to comply with the PPFA.In terms of the PPFA, which came into effect in 2021, every registered political party must keep records of their income, such as private donations and membership fees.Any donations which exceed the R100 000 threshold are published by the IEC on a quarterly basis. These requirements also apply to independent candidates.
Although the PPFA does not expressly impose this requirement on unrepresented political parties, in 2021, the IEC published regulations that every registered political party, irrespective of whether it is or is not represented in Parliament or a provincial legislature must provide an annual audit opinion to the IEC.
In 2022 and 2023, the IEC sent reminders to several parties and issued them with directives to submit their financial statements.The parties the IEC cited in the Electoral Court fell into two categories: parties who are represented in Parliament or provincial legislatures and parties not represented in legislatures .
Several of the non-represented parties argued they had no funds to hire an auditor and were unfairly required to provide audited financial statements in the same way as represented parties.Modiba said a lack of funding was not a sufficient reason, because the act expressly stated every registered party was required to provide audited financial statements.The IEC conceded the PPFA did not distinguish between represented and unrepresented parties.
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