ActionSA opposes My Vote Counts’ party funding case – Here’s why

ActionSA is opposing My Vote Counts’ (MVC) push to have sections of the Political Party Funding Act (PPFA) declared unconstitutional.

The party’s national chairperson Michael Beaumont was outside the Western Cape High Court on Monday where MVC’s application will be heard this week.

The non-profit organisation is aiming to have the disclosure parameters of political donations adjusted. ActionSA is one of 19 respondents to the application.

Multi-million rand donations

Currently, the PPFA dictates that any donations to political parties more than R100 000 need to be disclosed to the Electoral Commission (IEC).

All donations under that threshold can remain undisclosed. There’s also an upper donation limit of R15 million per year per juristic person.

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Among other points, MVC argues that the PPFA is open for abuse in how donors structure their donations, either donating multiple amounts under R100 000 or using family members or associated entities to donate more than R15 million.

One example of the latter is where two members of the Oppenheimer family donated R10 million each to the DA in February 2024, as disclosed on the IEC website.

ActionSA has also received large donations, most notably from Israeli-South African businessman Martin Moshal, who donated R9 million in three months before the 2024 elections.

Moshal is also a donor of the DA and Mmusi Maimane’s Build One South Africa, having spent at least R8 million and R11.5 million on the parties in early 2024, respectively.

Cash needed to promote democracy

MVC believes these large sums of money distort the public’s ability to make informed political decisions and result in parties dancing to the political tunes played by their donors.

Beaumont labelled MVC’s application “short-sighted”, and said the problem with the PPFA was not the donor thresholds, but cases of non-compliance.

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ActionSA’s national chairperson said donations under the threshold ensured anonymity for small donors and that suspicions on the intentions of large donors were unfounded.

“Any relief which unnecessarily throttles party funding impacts our electoral democracy,” said Beaumont on Monday.

“The political choices of South Africans, especially given the prolific failures of established parties, is only as good as the ability of parties to campaign and offer political alternatives,” he explained.

My Vote Counts’ funders

Beaumont stated the party fully supported transparency around funding but the discussion should be focused on the “important elements of our constitutional democracy”.

MVC is itself the recipient of multi-million donations from international sources.

MVC discloses on its website that it has received at least R13.6 million in donations since 2022, including R5.7 million from Open Society Foundations (OSF).

It has also received R2.2 million from Constitutionalism Fund — of which OSF is a founding member — R2.5 million from Millenium Trust and R2.3 million from The Raith Foundation.

These donations are generally spread out over two to three years and MVC states the donations have “no material influence” on its work.

MVC’s application will be heard in the Western Cape High Court from Monday until 19 February.

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