Supervisor of Elections Mohammed Saneem. [File Photo]

The Fijian Elections Office will be issuing letters to certain political parties in order to ascertain how they are funding certain programs or campaigns.

Supervisor of Elections Mohammed Saneem says the intent of the Political Parties Act is to ensure that a person who is donating is noted as the donor for the party.

He adds that the Act states that a political party cannot receive more than $10,000 in one particular donation in a year and a person cannot donate more than $10,000 in a year.

The FEO has noted certain groups that are disguised as political campaign tools and the funds collected have been funneled into the group instead of being recorded into political accounts.

Saneem says these campaigns includes the Rock The Vote Campaign, which is led by the People’s Alliance Movement Deputy Leader Lynda Tabuya,

“We will be looking into that because it is a representative of a political party who has been named as a potential candidate and who is a major donor to the group. So is it a campaign? We have been noting from the beginning of the year that certain buses were hired, and bus hiring is not cheap and that that is campaign funds from the way it looks. So we will be looking into this. We’ll be writing some letters, trying to ascertain this. And, of course, we know the representatives of certain political parties.”

Saneem says if the FEO is unable to establish the source of funds, then they might need to audit the political parties in order to confirm if they there is attempted breaches to the Act.

“It is absolutely important that all political parties adhere to the law and not have their representatives come up with ideas to circumvent the law. And we have seen this in terms of pseudo groups coming up under political party representatives, giving out donations, giving out chairs and benches to various locations or T-shirts. These will be swiftly referred to FICAC for necessary prosecutions. “

The final voter registration round will be conducted next month.