Legalising expensive political campaigns

Campaign finance inequality in Pakistan is expected to worsen during the upcoming election cycle. An amendment to the Election Act 2017 has created a loophole, allowing wealthy candidates and those backed by special interests to exceed campaign spending limits without fear of legal consequences. It is an incontestable fact that money in politics can tilt the playing field, erecting formidable barriers for aspiring candidates of assemblies and the Senate who lack strong connections or deep pockets. The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), like regulatory bodies elsewhere, has established limits on campaign spending by candidates. The law permits the Senate aspirants to spend up to Rs1.5 million, National Assembly candidates Rs10m and those contesting for a provincial assembly seat the maximum of Rs4m. What has actually been spent by candidates in the past three elections (2008, 2013 and 2018) has been assessed to be at least five times (500 per cent) the limit for all tiers, a fact that no one contests and even ECP officers accept privately. According to some unsubstantiated accounts, in Punjab, provincial assembly seat aspirants have already spent more than the permissible limit on purchasing PTI tickets in the current election cycle before the party disintegrated post-May 9, 2023 events.