Seputeh MP Teresa Kok said the recommendations by the National Consultative committee on Political Financing should not be entertained.
DAP leader Lim Kit Siang criticised integrity minister Paul Low, who had proposed removing the cap on election campaign funds, and said Low “dare not take a stand on Malaysia becoming a ‘global kleptocracy’ after he was appointed minister to look into integrity and good governance or on the issue of the 1MDB financial scandal”.
Low is the chairman of the consultative commitee, which on Friday released a list of proposals on campaign financing.
Kok adds one of the main issues at general elections had always been the opposition’s complaint that Barisan Nasional candidates overspent by big sums of money.
“That should be the main issue that the committee should have addressed. Instead, the committee has chosen to remove the expenses cap,” she said in a statement.
The most important point and purpose of capping election expenses was to prohibit money politics at general elections.
Kok said there had not been much objections about the difficulties faced by rural candidates caused by the present cap. “Even if there have been complaints, a higher limit could have been proposed for all or just the rural candidates. But why remove the cap totally?,” she said.
The current limits are RM100,000 in state assembly seats and RM200,000 in parliamentary seats.
In 2013, the Election Commission’s deputy chairman Wan Omar Wan Ahmad said the parliamentary select committee on electoral reforms had not brought up the issue nor requested that the limit be raised. He had also said the EC believed that the amount was more than sufficient.
“So where did Paul and his committee get the idea that the present limit is insufficient for rural candidates?” Kok said.
To prohibit money politics, she called for limits on election expenses, by candidates and parties, to an amount, with some reasonable weightage for rural candidates, agreeable to both government and opposition parties.