Project profile — Clean Money in Elections

Ultimately, this project aims to enhance accountability for transparency and gender equality of political finance to voters in Indonesia, Madagascar, Panama, Sri Lanka, Venezuela and Zambia. The project seeks to improve transparency in election and political party financing to ensure competitive democratic processes and equal opportunities for women candidates. The project will increase 1) public demand for, 2) political engagement to regulate, and 3) technical innovations to monitor the transparency, equality and integrity of political finance. Project activities include: (1) developing an assessment methodology for national assessments and case studies in consultation with chapters; (2) conducting (design, desk review, interview, analyse, consult, validate and publish) national assessments on the state of political finance governance and transparency practices. Also, the assessments include financial barriers for women’s participation in politics in Indonesia, Madagascar, Panama, Venezuela, and Zambia; (3) defining context (legal and technical), purpose, technical specifications (reporting database, user interface, etc.) and deployment plans for all 6 countries. Based on past election information, an estimated total of 246,570,452 eligible voters and more than 5,189 female candidates benefit from the project activities. Government institutions, political parties, CSOs, media and citizens also directly benefit from the project.

The expected outcomes of this project include: (1) improved frameworks and practice of transparency and gender equality in political finance by legislatures and oversight agencies in 6 countries; and (2) increased demand for transparency and gender equality in political finance by civil society groups in 6 countries.

Results achieved as of September 2024 include: (1) the program engaged almost 44,000 individuals in a pre-election monitoring campaign across 11 cities in Indonesia. This campaign revealed discrepancies between reported and actual political party funding, including gender-based financial inequalities.?This resulted in the formation of a coalition to push for greater accountability in Indonesia’s 2024 general and regional elections, with 14 media outlets reporting on findings; (2) TI initiated a broad scale pre-election skills-building program aimed at better informing citizens based on evidence and strengthening accountability mechanisms for a fair election in Venezuela. The project enabled 40 civil society members to use monitoring tools to highlight state resource abuses and electoral fraud. The program led to the documentation of over 300 state neutrality violations. Almost 500 individuals, civil society members, political party representatives, and independents participated in a series of 28 workshops on political finance violations and accountability. Collectively, these processes resulted in better informed citizens and strengthened accountability mechanisms; and (3) the program conducted 5 regional consultations involving 52 TI chapters as well as a global event involving 26 organizations by September 2024. It resulted in policy recommendations on implementing a new Global Standard on Political Finance Integrity and Gender Equality. The recommendations were based on expert reviews of incumbency abuse, financial barriers for women, and illicit financing.?