The Anti-Corruption Commission Found Holes in the Party Funding Law: There Is a Cap on Membership Fees, but No Penalty for Breaking It

The State Commission for Prevention of Corruption read the Law on Financing of Political Parties and found holes. Not one - a series. And not after somebody filed a complaint, but on its own initiative, as part of the anti-corruption plan for reviewing legislation in 2026.

The most important objection concerns Article 10, the one governing how the state budget splits money between parties. The commission's president, Adem Čučulj, phrased the question carefully but unambiguously: "It is legitimate to ask whether this kind of distribution is proportional and whether it provides fair and equal opportunities to all participants."

Money that grows, rules that do not change

The commission points to something rarely said out loud: the funds for financing parties are public money, and they are continuously increasing. That is why, the commission says, it needs to be re-examined whether the provision is purposeful, appropriate and fair, and whether it achieves the goal it was adopted for at all.

When the distribution of public money favours those already in power or already large, that is not an accident in the law - it is a design. Whether that is the case here, the commission does not claim. It only asks. But the fact that the state anti-corruption body had to open the question itself says a great deal about who has not wanted to open it until now.

A membership fee with no sanction

Article 14 governs the membership fees paid by party members. According to the commission, the provision lacks a preventive mechanism, and if somebody exceeds the prescribed level of the fee, the law's misdemeanour provisions foresee no sanction whatsoever.

That means a limit exists, but there is no consequence for breaking it. In party financing, that is a channel that opens itself.

Donations and registers

On Article 16, which sets the total amount of an individual donation from natural and legal persons, the commission asks for the legal gap to be removed and the provision to be aligned with the Electoral Code. Two laws are talking about the same money and they do not match.

Article 17 is even more interesting. It requires parties to make their donation registers available - via a website "or in another appropriate manner". The commission says it is not clear what that other appropriate manner is, which leaves room for subjective interpretation. Particularly, as it points out, for parties that have no website at all.

In other words: a party can claim the register was available, and nobody can prove it was not.

What the commission asks for in the end

In the report it will submit to the competent institutions, the commission recommends that Article 26 include an obligation for parties to submit their annual financial statements to the commission itself, in order to align with the Law on Prevention of Corruption and Conflict of Interest.

So, at the moment, the anti-corruption body does not have to receive the financial accounts of the parties whose funding it oversees. That recommendation says more about the state of things than any of the others.

The recommendations now go to the institutions. The law is amended by parliament. Parliament is made up of parties. Who is going to vote for stricter rules on their own funding?