New media vs money politics

Over the weekend, a group of 43 Filipino journalists led by editors and senior correspondents of mainstream media held a two-day conference entitled “The Frontiers of Transparency” on the occasion of the 6th Summit of the Philippine News Media at the Eugenio Lopez Center in Antipolo City.

Organized by Pagbabago@Pilipinas, along with the Asia Foundation and sponsored by corporate heavyweights, Ayala Corp. Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, SM Malls, Pagcor, and the United States Embassy; the focus of the conference was on campaign finance.

Flow of private money

Quoting from the 2008 Global Integrity Report, “…no other governance reform seems to create greater problems… than promoting transparency around the flow of private money into election campaigns and political party coffers.”

Pera’t Pulitika

In 2007, the team headed by Dr. Edna Co, of the University of the Philippines, undertook a pilot project, Pera’t Pulitika to monitor campaign spending during that year. The study was limited in scope. It looked at campaign spending zeroing on the media spending, primarily because such expenditures would be fairly easy to trace and documentary proof was readily available.

Massive Overspending

The study revealed massive overspending, which was not a surprise. But the magnitude of the overspending was “stunning… overspending wasn’t merely 50 percent or even 100 percent over the limit, it was 500 percent, 1,000 percent and even as high as 5,000 percent.”

Dynamics of donations

The objectives of the media summit are: To afford media practitioners an understanding of campaign finance, the amounts, the potential donors, the dynamics of donations during elections, and a commitment to cover campaign finance in the coming presidential elections.

A major problem

Largely hidden from view is the growing number of foreign political donations coming from international business. No foreigner can legally donate to a local campaign but there are ways of going around this regulation. The money can be advanced by the local partner or could be placed in an account offshore, say in Macau or Hong Kong for the benefit of the presidential candidate. The businessmen coming from such places as Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan, have become more aggressive in their political donations of late. The Taiwanese have always considered the Philippines as their second home. Some hold dual citizenships. Their business interests are so diverse that it is becoming increasingly difficult to monitor where the money is going.

Expenses other than media

While experts estimate media spending to be 50 percent of the total budget for the campaign, and could readily be accessed by an enterprising journalist, it would be extremely difficult to trace the amounts that go to the political leaders for reimbursement of their expenses. Moreover, the bulk of the expenses for election day watchers which could amount to least P1.5. Consider that a candidate must guard the precincts on election day. There are approximately 180,000 precincts all over the country. You need three watchers for every precinct. They are hired at least 12 days before elections, with two day seminars on new regulations that may be imposed by the Commission on Elections. Each watcher is paid P300 each multiply by three, which would be P900, multiply this by 12, equals P10,800, multiplied by 180,000 precincts would come up to P1.94 billion. Food for three days at P600 a day or P1,800 multiplied by 180,000 is a pretty hefty sum.

Unreliable local leaders

Relying on your local leaders is not enough, unless the local leader has a special relationship with the candidate. If the local candidate loses, he will lose his interest in guarding the ballot. If he wins, he will, as a rule, guard your ballot by asking his own leaders to do the job for him.

For a well-run campaign, the watchers are the responsibility of the presidential candidate, not the local candidate. That was one of the reasons Fernando Poe Jr.’s votes were not guarded as they should have been.

These expenses appear to be mundane. They are small amounts and would not attract too much attention, but together, to be truly nationwide, it is a huge task.

Mock elections

Smartmatic-TIM, in one of the sessions, conducted mock elections using its technology to illustrate its capability. They asked Reli German, one of the panelists, to choose 20 who would cast their vote. Reli chose eight women and 12 gentlemen from the participants. They were asked to choose a presidential candidate from a list of five: Joseph Estrada, Loren Legarda, Chiz Escudero, Manny Villar and Noynoy Aquino. The results of the voting? Three ballots were declared invalid. Noynoy received 50 percent of the valid votes and the rest of the field received 36 percent.

According to one of the panelists, the reason Noynoy waited for the 40th day of Cory’s death anniversary is that he wanted to be sure that a quiet survey in the National Capital Region was completed before he made his announcement. The survey showed him in double digits.

As one of the participants dared to say: The new media might change the balance of power in political campaigns. The new media versus money politics? Not likely. –Daily Tribune