FRANICA PULIS spoke to the MEP candidates on their electoral spending limits
Edward Demicoli hasn’t done it yet, but thinks he will have by the end of the campaign.
Arnold Cassola and Josie Muscat avoided doing it themselves, but both agree there shouldn’t be a law about it in the first place.
Alan Deidun hasn’t done it yet, but thinks everyone else already has. And on this, nearly all other candidates agree with him.
We are talking about overspending on their personal campaigns - a thorny issue, in a country where the national legal limit of Lm600 (€1,400) per district has been routinely flouted for decades.
For the MEP election of 6 June there are 34 candidates fighting for Malta’s five available seats (six, if you include the observer status seat to be decided by the Irish referendum in October). Candidates were asked three questions: have they spent the €1,400 (Lm600) on every district which totals up to €18,170 (Lm7,800)? If not will they spend them by the end of their campaign? And do they agree with these constraints in the first place?
From the 16 candidates we managed to get hold of, only Edward Demicoli (PN) admitted that he might go overboard as the sum “does not even cover sending a flyer by post to all Malta and Gozo”.
The rest all said that they haven’t spent the sum yet, and will not spend it in the next few days.
Arnold Cassola (AD) and Josie Muscat (AN) both said their campaigns were held by the parties themselves and no personal promotional material was created. Personal expenses were limited to phone-calls, petrol and a deposit of €90 for their candidature.
Glenn Bedingfield (PL), Claudette Abela Baldacchino (AN) and Marthese Portelli (PN) replied that they chose to focus their campaign mainly on meeting personally with people, for which reason they did not overshoot the financial limit.
But Cassola, Muscat, Abela Baldacchino, Alan Deidun (PN), Yvonne Arqueros Ebejer (AD) all hinted that surely other candidates were spending a lot of money, much more than they were actually saying.
In fact Muscat, like Demicoli, mentioned the expenses involved in posting a letter to all households in Malta and Gozo, which according to him amounts to the total permissible sum of €6,000.
Deidun likewise said: “I haven’t spent more than €5,000. Others spent much more. I know that for sure.”
Cassola further pointed out that this situation has been ongoing for ages.
“People have been breaking this law for years. One need only check the Sunday newspapers to realise that. But nothing has ever been done to change it. I’m against people breaking the law, but this law doesn’t make sense. If it is not feasible, why create a law and then and put no one to enforce it?”
Candidates who agreed with the existence of a limit to personal campaign expenditure include Deidun, Arqueros Ebejer and Abela Baldacchino, who thinks the sum might have to be reviewed.
Those who disagree were Rudolph Cini, Josie Muscat, Arnold Cassola and Sharon Ellul Bonici. Cini believes that nowadays there shouldn’t be any more limitations and one should be responsible for his/her expenses. Ellul Bonici replied: “I don’t believe in having these limits. After all, the candidate is working for the party and to promote what he believes in...”
Those who were Maria Camilleri (Libertas), Portelli and Joseph Cuschieri (PL) felt that it was not up to them to decide on this matter. Vince Farrugia (PL) argued that there should be a limit, otherwise the campaigns will depend on donations and will lose their independence. However, in certain cases the limit might not be fair on candidates who are not as well known as others, and therefore had to spend more.
Christian Zammit (PL) and Steve Borg (PL) both claimed to have kept their expenses very low, by focusing mainly on distribution of flyers in specific parts of Malta.
Zammit has focused only on Gozo, while Borg on the south of Malta.
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