Unregulated flows of money in the funding of political parties and election campaigns threaten key democratic principles and values in African countries.

When politicians and political parties focus more on financiers than public interests and needs, service delivery may be compromised for political expediency. Enormous strides have been made since 1990 to tackle the scourge of political corruption on the continent. However, corrupt activities associated with political finance regulations persist.

This policy paper:

• analyses political finance regulatory trends in Africa, identifies corruption risk areas in such regulations, and provides actionable policy recommendations for key stakeholders to improve transparency and accountability in political finance;
• examines good practices for political finance regulation, the challenges of an integrity-enhanced political finance system and explores options for redress; and
• identifies key themes in the political finance framework, such as sources of finance, limits on funding, limits on party and candidate spending, and lessons learned regarding the effectiveness of regulatory mechanisms on the continent.

Similar analysis is also available for Asia, Central and Eastern Europe and Latin America.