Draft law on financing of political parties/ Venice Commission gives assessment, shares recommendations

2026-06-17 11:03:00, Politikë CNA

Draft law on financing of political parties/ Venice Commission gives assessment,

The Venice Commission has positively assessed the draft law "On the Financing of Political Parties", which was sent for review by the Albanian Parliament.

According to the Venice Commission, it is assessed that the draft law aims to increase transparency, accountability and integrity in the financing of political parties.

Likewise, the experts of this commission have divided recommendations into 6 different categories, to harmonize the regulation that will serve political parties in the country in the future.

Venice Commission Recommendations

A. Ensure that the rules relating to the regular financing of political parties and those relating to the financing of election campaigns are harmonized and do not conflict with each other.

B. Provide for more precise and detailed regulations in the draft law itself, leaving only technical aspects to the sub-legal acts, and ensure that the implementing rules adopted by the Central Election Commission and the Council of Ministers are based on sufficiently clear, objective and predictable criteria.

C. More comprehensively regulate clandestine financing and indirect financing through third parties, as well as through entities affiliated with or controlled by political parties.

D. Clearly define in the law that the financial reports of political parties must include, in detail and divided by category:

-all sources of income;

-all expenses;

-assets;

-financial obligations;

-credits and loans;

-debts;

-guarantees;

-in-kind contributions;

-services provided below market value;

-transactions with related entities;

-public support in kind;

-expenditures on media and digital communication;

-Gender equality and youth representation grant.

Also, more frequent financial reporting should be considered, especially during election years.

E. Strengthen the supervision of political party financing, by:

-creating clear cooperation mechanisms between the Central Election Commission and other state institutions;

-guaranteed that the CEC has a clear mandate, full powers and sufficient resources to effectively and proactively oversee the financing of political parties;

-ensure that the CEC has the ability to investigate suspected violations of political financing rules;

- regulate in more detail the special structure for financing, monitoring and control of political party financing that is planned to be created within the CEC, including guarantees for its independence;

-strengthen the independence of accounting experts who audit the financial reports of political parties.

F. Review the provisions on sanctions, so that:

- there should be sanctions for the violation of all obligations and prohibitions provided for by law;

-there should be a wider range of punitive measures, which should be effective, proportionate and dissuasive;

-consider increasing some administrative fines;

- the measure of prohibiting a party from participating in elections due to certain violations of the law should be applied only in serious cases, as a last resort, after the party has been given the opportunity to correct the violation and only after effective judicial control. /CNA