Abdul Khalik, Jakarta – Elections supervising bodies have begun probing a number of political parties running lavish media ads campaigns after being unable to trace back money deposited into their accounts.
The Elections Supervisory Council (Bawaslu) and the Financial Transaction Reports Analysis Center (PPATK) have said some parties have spent billions of rupiah on intensive television and print media campaigns without providing information on where the money is coming from.
According to the elections law, a political party must submit a financial report and list its bank accounts, citing explanations of sources, within three days of being passed to run in the elections.
Bawaslu chairman Nur Hidayat Sardini said after signing an MOU with PPATK a week ago that his office and the financial intelligence body had begun analyzing suspicious transactions linked to political parties.
"We analyze the initial financial reports of the parties and compare the amounts in their accounts with their spending on ads," Sardini said.
He said if the numbers did not match up, Bawaslu and the PPATK would trace the flow of money to identify the benefactors and determine whether the transactions had exceeded the limits allowed by the law.
The law stipulates that an individual must not donate more than Rp 1 billion (US$86,956) to a political party, and an entity or organization cannot give more than Rp 5 billion.
PPATK chairman Yunus Hussein has raised concerns some parties may be in breach of the elections law. "The ads are very costly. It's a slight possibility that party members or supporters are willing to donate a bulk of the money," he said.
Yunus called on the public to submit information on private donations to aid in the investigations.
A number of parties have conducted aggressive advertising campaigns in the past several months, including Prabowo Subianto's Greater Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra), Wiranto's the People's Conscience Party (Hanura), President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's the Democratic Party, Sutrisno Bachir's the National Mandate Party (PAN) and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).
Sutrisno, whose party has spend most on advertising, appears 180 times per day in TV commercials on 11 stations throughout the country. A 30-second TV ad costs on average Rp 20 million.
According to AC Nielsen Media Research, spending on political ads from January to June this year reached Rp 769 billion, a 79 percent increase from the same period last year.
The research institution estimated spending would increase as the elections drew nearer.
Hadar Gumay of the Center for Electoral Reform urged parties to be transparent in fund raising and spending to avoid coming across as suspicious, citing that transparency won voters.