Two support state support for parties

TWO renowned Ghanaians, a political scientist and an economist, have advanced arguments in support of state funding of political parties in the country.
Mr. Kwesi Jonah, a Senior Lecturer at the Political Science Department, Legon, and Dr Nii Moi Thompson, an economist, said that supporting Ghana’s multi-party democracy through funding of political parties was in a way also creating conditions for economic development.
They argued that political parties were the building blocks on which democracy was built and therefore funding them would help to build their capacity and enrich public discourse and development while at the same time improving the quality of public policy.
In separate interviews, Mr Jonah, who is also a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Democratic Governance (IDEG), pointed out that people should, therefore, not draw a sharp distinction between building the country’s democracy and building economic development.
“My main arguments are that democracy and economic development are two vital processes that the country is passing through,” he stated.
He said that he had heard some people opposing the idea of state supporting political parties with public money.
According to Mr Jonah, it was erroneous for some people to argue that because Ghana had so many socio-economic needs such as hospitals, schools, potable water, roads and other such things, monies should rather be spent on those needs instead of supporting political parties.
Furthermore, Mr Jonah said, democracy and good governance were in themselves important for economic growth and development, hence, if the country’s political system was not democratic, it would be difficult to achieve economic growth and development.
“So we must support both processes because the two things go hand in hand,” Dr Jonah stated.
He explained that the developed countries in the world were also the most democratic and cited the US, Japan, Germany, UK and France as very developed and very democratic.
“So when you support political parties, you are in a way creating the conditions for economic development,”
Mr Jonah said and further argued that “we borrow money to support our economic development but people do not want to spend money to develop our democracy”.
This attitude must change, he pointed out, and stressed the need for the country to invest in her economic development and at the same time invest in her democracy.
He also pointed out that the Political Parties Law 2000 gave many responsibilities to the political parties, including opening offices in two thirds of the districts of Ghana and every regional capital.
The law also enjoined them to prepare and submit financial statement to the Electoral Commission and give an account of their electoral expenditures after every election.
“Where are they going to find the money to open offices and maintain them as the law requires,” Mr Jonah queried.
“So the law has given responsibilities to the parties and there is nothing wrong with supporting them with money in order for them to honour and meet these responsibilities,” he argued.
“I know that we have competing needs but these needs will be better met if we have a clean and democratic government and only political parties can give us that,” he said.
For his part, Dr Thompsom said people who had argued against state funding of political parties with the claim that the nation had more pressing issues than funding political parties had forgotten about how much Ghana invested in football alone.
He said the fact that individuals had formed political parties, with some of them abusing their offices, did not mean that they should not be funded, and suggested that funding could be given to those who had exhibited financial discipline, membership and financial drive.
“It is in our long term interest to have as many political parties as possible to engage in discourse and present credible alternative,” he said and added that “by helping political parties to sustain themselves, we will be reducing their dependence on predatory individuals who give them money ostensibly for altruistic reason”.
“Do you want cocaine barons to fund our political parties so that when the parties come to power, the barons would be made ambassadors and ministers? Only God knows where they will take the country to,” Dr Thompsom said.
He noted that because political parties were not financially sound, they were not able to engage the services of professionals, especially economists and development experts, to advise them on issues.
He said those experts who were politically inclined only offered their services as members and on part-time basis, and this accounted for weak capacity of the various political parties.
According to Dr Thompsom, although the country stood to gain more in funding political parties than not doing that, stringent measures must be put in place to ensure that the funds were used for the intended purposes and also accounted for.