Candidates’ expenditure ceilings in Electoral Act

In the enactment of the Electoral Act 2022, the National Assembly has made some critical changes in the campaign finance provisions of the law. It will be recalled that Nigerians generally believe that our politics is highly monetised and a process of demonetisation needs to be put in place either in law or policy and such provisions need to be meticulously implemented. This discourse reviews the changes made in the 2022 Electoral Act on campaign finance and how they relate to the reduction of the influence of money in politics.

In the provisions of the repealed Electoral Act 2010 as amended, the maximum electoral expenses to be incurred by candidates at a presidential election was one billion naira; governorship election was pegged at two hundred million naira; a senatorial seat at forty million naira while the seat for House of Representatives had an upper limit expenditure of twenty million naira. A candidate for a State Assembly election was allowed the maximum expenditure of ten million naira; a chairmanship election to an Area Council, the maximum amount of election expenses to be incurred was ten million naira while councillorship election candidates had a maximum expenditure of one million naira. No individual or entity was permitted to donate more than one million naira to a candidate.

The 2022 Act has increased the respective expenditure ceilings. By S.88, a presidential candidate is now at liberty to spend up to five billion naira while governorship candidates can spend up to one billion naira; Senate and House of Representatives candidates can spend up to a maximum of one hundred million naira and seventy million naira respectively. Members of the state legislature, chairmanship of local governments/area councils are permitted to spend up to thirty million naira while councillorship candidates have a ceiling of five million naira. The sum an individual or entity could donate to a candidate has now been raised to fifty million naira. But there is a contradiction here. Imagine the scenario where a candidate for the House of Assembly gets a donation of fifty million naira while his ceiling is thirty million naira. What happens to the excess?

However, empirical evidence shows that the provisions for these expenditure limits in the 2010 Act were more obeyed in the breach as candidates most times spent above the ceiling. In some cases, candidates spent more than five to ten times above the ceiling. The activation challenge with the old provisions continued in the new 2022 Act. Candidates were given ceilings but the Act did not create reporting obligations for candidates. It only created reporting obligations for political parties whilst the presidential system of election had all along been candidate-centric. So, how do we determine that a candidate has spent above the ceiling without a reporting obligation? The electoral umpire, the Independent National Electoral Commission, had made regulations requiring candidates to report their expenditure, a regulation that has also been more obeyed in the breach.

Another challenge to the old provisions, which has been carried over in the 2022 Act, is the fact that money quickly loses value in Nigeria as a result of currency depreciation and inflation. Experts had recommended that the power to impose expenditure limits should have been an administrative power left to INEC after it had consulted the political parties and monetary authorities. The implication of extant provisions is that an amendment of the law will be required anytime there is the need to either reduce or increase the ceilings. This is an unnecessarily cumbersome procedure.

The logic and empirical basis of the above limitations were not articulated in the 2022 Act. Is it based on the number of voters to be addressed by the candidate or the land area to be covered or media and other expenses? The ceilings appear arbitrary. For instance, if a presidential candidate with 36 states to cover is to spend five billion naira, why should the Act allow a gubernatorial candidate with one out of 36 states to spend one-fifth of the presidential candidate’s ceiling? If a senatorial zone is one-third of a state, why did the Act not grant senatorial candidates one-third of the governor’s ceiling? What is the relationship between the area covered by a senatorial seat and that of a House of Representatives seat?

The Act is silent on third party expenditure. Thus, third parties seem to be at liberty to spend any amount of money on a candidate subject to the overall limitation of fifty million. But if these third parties are associations, they have been barred by S. 221 of the Constitution from canvassing for support or spending money on behalf of candidates or political parties. Third party expenditure can create a leeway for a candidate to continue spending on his campaign (after he has reached the ceiling) if he transfers the money to the third parties.

Furthermore, the 2022 Act is also crafted in such a manner that these expenditure limits do not preclude the political party sponsoring the candidate from incurring other costs on behalf of the candidate. Thus, when a candidate hits the ceiling and still has some more resources available, s/he can transfer the same to the political party and expenses will continue on his behalf by the party. Pray, is there a real ceiling? This was a challenge in the old law still carried over to the new dispensation.

Again, the Act is silent on the tax status of donations and contributions to candidates and political parties. Ideally, the donations should earn tax credits as a tax-deductible expense. But this will be limited to donations not more than an amount lower than the fifty million allowed for individuals and entities under the Act. This will encourage popular participation in campaign finance (funding political parties and candidates at elections) and reduce the influence of money bags in politics. Thus, the mischief of the overbearing influence of money bags and godfathers will be suppressed while the remedy of involving a large part of the population in campaigns and party financing will be advanced.

In the final analysis, the provisions of the 2022 Act on campaign finance did not benefit from an empirical analysis of the facts and challenges in the old law. It had neither suppressed the mischief existing in the old law nor has it advanced a remedy to the mischief. Although to the average Nigerian, these new expenditure limits appear huge, candidates will still exceed the ceilings, especially at the presidential level because the actual legitimate cost of elections is very high.