For the first time in Sri Lanka, six prominent Election Observation Organizations, namely, Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL), People’s Action for Free and Fair Elections (PAFFREL), Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE), Centre for Monitoring Election Violence (CMEV), Hashtag Generation, and the Institute for Democratic Reforms and Electoral Studies (IRES) have established a Campaign Finance Observation Online Tool to observe the campaign expenditures of election candidates at the Presidential Election 2024.
The tool named “Chanda Salli Meetare” aims to advocate for the effective implementation of the Regulation of Election Expenditure Act of 2023, empower citizens with vital information to make informed voting decisions, ensure a level-playing field among presidential candidates, and foster a free, fair and inclusive electoral environment that upholds democratic values.
The collaborative tool was launched today (August 16) at BMICH in Colombo with the presence of the Commission members and the Commissioner General of the Election Commission of Sri Lanka, presidential candidates and their representatives, political party representatives, diplomatic missions and civil society organizations.
Nadishani Perera, Executive Director of TISL, Manjula Gajanayake, Executive Director of IRES, Saman Sri Ratnayake, Commissioner General of ECSL, Rohana Hettiarachchie, Executive Director of PAFFREL, Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, Executive Director of Center for Policy Alternatives (CPA), Manas Makeen, Executive Director of CaFFE, and Darshatha Gamage, Specialist – Elections and Information Integrity at Hashtag Generation, addressed the gathering.
The tool is designed to contribute to the long-term goals of promoting transparency and accountability in Sri Lanka’s electoral processes. By increasing public awareness of the role of money in election campaigns and its influence on voter decisions, it encourages citizen engagement in campaign finance observing through the dedicated website ‘www.chandasallimeetare.lk’.
The website displays presidential candidates’ profiles with valuable insights on their campaign expenditure broken down into selected cost categories namely;
mainstream media, social media, billboards and cutouts, public events, press conferences, launch ceremonies, and campaign offices. The profiles may include the candidates’ asset declarations, election manifesto, and links to external resources to view their parliament performance etc., if available publicly.
The campaign expenditure is calculated based on pre-determined minimum average costings and formulas for each category. In addition to dedicated monitoring of social media and mainstream media-based campaigning, election observers will be deployed across the country by the election watchdogs to gather information on ground-level election expenditures in their respective electorates. The website provides the facility for citizens to also provide information about campaign activities of candidates.
A Secretariat, which consists of a dedicated team of campaign finance experts and an IT specialist, has been set up to handle the back-end system of the tool. All data submitted by election observers and citizens will be verified before they are made publicly available through the “Chanda Salli Meetare”.
The law requires all election candidates and parties to submit their returns (financial reports) after the election to the Election Commission. By implementing this tool, the financial data contained in the returns could be compared with the findings of the campaign finance observations collectively done by the Election Monitoring Organizations and reported through the website.
The scope of observations of expenditure will be limited to a selected number of key cost categories that are feasible to be monitored within the capacity of these organizations and therefore, will not reflect the entirety of each candidate’s expenditure. The tool, which will be first executed at the Presidential election, is expected to be adapted and extended to the upcoming other elections as well.
The election observation organizations appeal to the citizens to get involved and support this process to track the election expenditures of candidates, by submitting information on campaign activities in their respective areas, through the user-friendly website which can be accessed through mobile phones or computers. At the same time, we call upon all presidential candidates to adhere to campaign expenditure laws and show that you are prepared to lead by example.
