Country in the dark on party finances since 2019

The most recent financial reports showing the amount of cash donated to Maltese political parties from the public, and how much the parties are indebted, are yet to be published: the last reports uploaded by the Electoral Commission date back four years.

In a sign of lax enforcement on party financing, the Labour Party’s accounts for 2019 – presented two years too late in March 2022 – are still not available to the public.

The Nationalist Party has yet to submit its 2021 reports, and although all parties have submitted their financial and donation reports for 2020, none are yet published by the Electoral Commission.

On the other hand, Labour has submitted its 2020 and 2021 reports but they are still not available. 

The law regulating political party financing stipulates that all political parties have to present their statement of accounts, and a separate report listing the donations they received in each particular year, by not later than April of the next financial year.

This means that the PN should have submitted its 2021 documents in April 2022.

Asked why Labour’s accounts for 2019 have still not been published, Chief Electoral Commissioner Joseph B. Camilleri said this report is being reviewed by the Electoral Commission’s financial advisors “together with other reports” because “it is customary for reports to be examined in batches and not individually”. 

According to Camilleri, the review process is expected to be finalised in the coming weeks, and the reports will then be published as soon as the Electoral Commission gives the go-ahead.

Asked to explain why none of the financial accounts and donation reports filed by political parties for 2020 and 2021 have been published, Camilleri replied that these “reports are being examined in batches and not individually” and that the review process is also expected to be finalised in the coming weeks.

Previous delays in the publication of these reports had been attributed to extensions of deadlines granted by the commission during the pandemic.

State of the parties 

The Nationalist Party’s accounts for 2019, showing a deficit of €607,279, were published on the Electoral Commission’s website in May 2022.

But the Labour Party has so far evaded public scrutiny of its financial situation as the party has not presented accounts since 2018, when the party registered a surplus of €962,064.

The last donation reports by the PL and the PN also date back to 2019. Both parties failed to declare one single donation exceeding the transparency limit of €7,000. By law, parties are only obliged to publish the source of donations above this threshold.

Both major parties declared a considerable amount of money from individuals and companies whose donations exceeded €500 but stayed below €7,000, meaning the source will only be known to the Commission but not to the public.

Labour declared €326,510 from 138 different donations of over €500, an average of €2,366 each. The PN received 333 such donations, totalling €775,298 – an average of €2,328.