Angola: Political party funding

Updated July 2006

State funding

Law 2/05 (2005) says, "parties have the right to equality of treatment by all of the entities that exercise public power, namely... the grant of support and subsidies and access to State finance, in accordance with the terms of the law" (Article 7) and later: "The regime applicable to financing, financing prohibitions, benefits and exemptions, as well as infractions and corresponding penalties shall be established by law" (Article 40). Law 7/04 (2004) says:

"1. The State shall determine the budgetary support given to the campaigns of the election candidates. The support shall be distributed to all candidate in an equitable manner. 2. The support referred to in the preceding paragraph shall be made available to the political parties or coalitions of parties and to the candidates who have been declared as participating in the election, as from ninety days prior to the date of the elections. 3. The National Election Commission shall approve the criteria used as the basis for distribution of the public finance funds for the presidential and parliamentary elections. This criteria shall be based on the principle of equality for all of the competing parties and coalitions of parties" (Article 95).

From the above it would seem that all registered political parties (and candidates) are entitled to state finance of campaigning during the election period. The CNE is established as the authority that is to determine how these funds are to be distributed. No clear formula is laid out for the CNE on how to proceed, but two guidelines are given, "an equitable manner (forma equitativa)" and "the principle of equality (do princípio da igualdade)". Although "equitable" and "equal" do not necessarily mean the same thing, in this context it seems that they do.

However, as Augusto Santana (2006, 46) makes clear, the law was changed and the provisions of Law 7/04 (2004) no longer applied: "Those parties with no MPs in the National Assembly suffer the most financially because, according to the Law of Political Parties, they cannot receive state support until such time as they have representatives in parliament". This view is confirmed by the Embassy of Angola (2006): "The problem of the funding of non-parliamentary parties came to the fore after the adoption of the Law on the Financing of Parties, part of the legislative package adopted by the National Assembly to permit the holding of elections. Under the new law, there was to be no more state funding of parties without parliamentary seats".

A once-off provision for the funding of extra-parliamentary parties has been made. The Embassy of Angola article reports: "The government is to spend about US$16.2 million on allowances for political parties without parliamentary seats, following a resolution adopted by the National Assembly. A Ministry of Finance source said on 1 March that his Ministry would be paying the equivalent of US$120,000 each to 135 political parties without parliamentary seats" (See also Kibble 2006, footnote 6). This no way changes the law as it stands, but merely makes an enabling budgetary provision for a once-off expenditure.

References

KIBBLE, S 2006, "Angola: from politics of disorder to politics of democratisation?" IN Progressio, 25 April, [www] http://www.ciir.org/Templates/Internal.asp?NodeID=92955 [opens new window] (accessed 22 Oct 2007).

LAW NO 2/05 OF 1 JULY 2005 [www] http://aceproject.org/regions-en/eisa/AO/ zz%20Law%20No%202%2005%201%20of%20July.pdf [PDF document, opens new window] (accessed 30 May 2008).
Lei No 2/05 de 1 de Julho, [www] http://aceproject.org/ero-en/misc/to-be-filed/ Lei%20No%202%2005%20de%201%20de%20Julho.pdf [PDF document, opens new window] (accessed 30 May 2008).

REPUBLIC OF ANGOLA EMBASSY IN THE UK 2006, Newletter 112, February, [www] http://www.angola.org.uk/newsletter113.htm [opens new window] (accessed 22 Oct 2007).

SANTANA, A 2006, Political Parties and Political Evolution in Angola | Os Partidos e a Evolução Política em Angola [PDF document], EISA Research Report No 28.