Where are the candidates running for local level offices getting all the money they are lavishing on expensive campaigning paraphernalia and in looking after jumbo door-to-door teams?

It is an open secret that even the candidates for local elections spend millions of rupees on their campaigns. But there is no proper tracking of this money. In principle, it is the duty of the Election Commission to monitor election campaigns and keep tabs on candidates’ spendings. But keeping a close watch on the campaigns of thousands of candidates is beyond its capacity.

Prospective candidates start investing big months before the elections. To get an election ticket from their party, they have to appease key leaders at the center as well as at the local level. Usually, this entails some kind of cash handover. 

On April 27, senior Nepali Congress (NC) leader Shekhar Koirala had courted controversy by saying that a lot of money had changed hands during candidate-selection for local elections. Koirala said this after scores of Congress sympathizers from across the country complained to him that honest and committed cadres were being sidelined and that the party was nominating those who were rich.  

Political analyst and election-expenditure researcher Binod Sijapati says money’s role in the distribution of election tickets is pervasive. 

“We have heard of aspiring election candidates competing to buy election tickets from top party leaders,” he says. “After securing the candidacy, there are many other areas where they have to spend large sums. A big chunk of their election war-chest goes in cadre-mobilization.” 

Cadre mobilization has become a costly affair because the candidate selection process has been highly centralized. This means local-level cadres are reluctant to work for the candidate picked from the center. 

“So the candidates rely on the power of money to woo cadres and mobilize local cadres,” Sijapati says. “They also hand out money and meals to lure voters in rural areas”

Other key spending areas are transport and promotional material such as pamphlets, posters, flags, and T-shirts. 

So where indeed do candidates get hold of large sums of money to pour into their campaigns? 

They rely on local businessmen, contractors, and profit-oriented institutions.  

 According to Sijapati, funding the election campaign of a candidate is akin to an investment with the promise of high returns.  

“Candidates are ready to gamble away their own assets because if they win, they can gain so much more through back channels,” he adds. 

Candidates can accept donations from their well-wishers but such donations can only be routed through transparent banking channels. Instead, they choose to get their election expenditures from other sources, the ones that cannot be easily traced.

Businessmen and other interest groups are more than happy to invest in elections. If their chosen candidate wins, they will find ways to influence policies and decisions of local governments to not just recoup their investment but also to make hefty profits. For them, this is a simple quid pro quo investment, but that in turn promotes local-level corruption.

“In some cases, even the candidates don’t know how much money is being spent as people with different interests are financing their campaigns,” says Sijapati.

Then there are also some candidates who are taking out loans from their friends and relatives, even though their numbers are believed to be negligible.   

Yet there is an upside to election and campaign spending, no matter where it originates. 

Some economists see it as an opportunity to launder black money. They even hope that the current liquidity crisis will be eased after the elections. 

Political parties have reportedly amassed big amounts of cash to fund their election campaigns. As parties splurge on this cash, much of it could be routed into banking channels.

The downside of heavy campaign financing is that democracy suffers as a result. Elections are no more free and fair and governance is corrupted.

Expensive elections are not just a worry for the Election Commission. Even some political parties have been expressing concern. But fixing this problem is not easy. 

The legal and institutional mechanisms in place are hardly ever implemented. The poll governing body fixes expenditure ceilings for candidates, but without effective monitoring, there are no effective curbs in place.  

Surya Prasad Aryal, assistant spokesperson at the commission, says the body is trying to monitor election campaigns through its district and local level representatives.

The commission has set a ceiling of Rs 750,000 for mayor and deputy mayor candidates of metropolitan cities and Rs 550,000 for those contesting these top posts in sub-metropolitan cities. For the chairperson and vice-chairperson candidates of municipalities and rural municipalities, the ceilings have been set at Rs 450,000 and Rs 350,000 respectively.

Candidates are also required to open a separate bank account for the purpose of election campaigning and to appoint accountants. All transactions, big or small, should be made through bank checks. The rule also states that all candidates should submit their poll expenditure details within 30 days of the completion of elections. 

But so long as candidates continue to rely on undisclosed sources to fund their elections, the actual figures they spend on their campaigns will remain a secret. 

In 2017, a study by the Election Observation Committee, an NGO, estimated that Rs 13bn was spent on the three levels of elections; the candidates alone spent Rs 9.6bn. But these are at best rough estimates.

Ila Sharma, former election commissioner, concedes that hamstrung by lack of resources the Election Commission alone cannot track the money spent by candidates across the country. 

“What the commission can do is rigorously vet the documents of expenditure submitted by candidates after the elections. But it rarely does so,” she says.

When the elections are over, she suggests, the commission should invite officers from the Office of the Auditor General to go through the requisite documents. 

“It is obvious that political parties and their candidates are spending millions on election campaigns. We just don’t know how much,” Sharma says. 

Voters also have a role in bringing down election costs. 

Both Sharma and Sijapati ask voters to discourage the candidates who try to influence voting patterns with their money. 

But most of all, it is the responsibility of political parties to reduce the influence of money in the election process and to field clean and competent candidates.  

To control election spendings and promote better election candidates, some experts have long suggested a fully-proportional election system. But again, it is the political parties that will once again have to take the onus for this.