Azerbaijani ruling party voices attitude on state financing of parties

The ruling New Azerbaijan party considers the principle of financing political parties from the state budget unjust.

A meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on Legal Policy and State Building was held today with the participation of representatives of political parties.

While discussing the changes to the law on political parties, party official Ali Ahmadov said the proposed state financing mechanism does not correspond to with the interests of the ruling party. About 84 MPs from 11 parties have been represented in the Azerbaijani Parliament.

About 71 are members of the ruling party, 13 - members of other parties.

According to the international experience, about 80-84 percent of the state funds should be allocated to the ruling party. According to a new mechanism, the ruling party will receive 45.6 percent of financing from the state budget, he said.

"I think this allocation as unfair," he added.

According to the proposed changes, about 10 percent of the allocated funds will be distributed among the political parties which nominated their candidates in the last elections to the Azerbaijani Parliament, gained less than three percent and are not represented in the parliament. About 40 percent of the funds will be divided between the
political parties represented in the parliament, while 50 percent will be distributed in proportion to the number of elected MPs.


/Trend/