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There is always a debate on the role of money in politics and similarly how the wealthy or rich politicians impact the political platforms. Politicians who are rich always find it easy to spend or mobilise resources for campaigns. They also attract useful cadres or supporters who are merely interested in pecuniary benefits and not moved by the deep sense of royalty or any conviction in party ideologies.
Sometimes, there is a thread of thought that wealth brings success in politics. However, a debate has always played out around the world with regard to the success rate of the wealthy or rich people politics.
In developed countries such as in Europe and the United States of America (USA), political scholars have been trying to understand how rich people’s money has impacted on the political terrain of various countries.
In the US, many voters have expressed their depressing thoughts fearing that money is killing their democracy while in Britain, campaign spending is tightly regulated but worse still the total figures invested in campaigns are always worrisome.
For instance in the last election in Britain, there was a total registered voters of 45.6 million and about $54.3 million was spent. Further, a casual scan down the election spending for various states shows that the seventh costliest Senate race cost more than the entire 2010 general election in Britain.
The Americans voters are further worried that public faith in democracy is being undermined by vast sums of corrupting money and there is a prevailing suspicion that elected representatives are essentially bought and paid for by wealthy special interests.
According to a research conducted by political scientist Steve Levitt, there were interesting findings on the impact that money from the wealthy and rich politicians have on an election.
The research found that when a candidate doubled their spending, holding everything else constant, they only got an extra one percent of the popular vote.
“It’s the same if you cut your spending in half, you only lose one percent of the popular vote. So we’re talking about really large swings in campaign spending with almost trivial changes in the vote,” Levitt report stated.
What Levitt’s study suggests is that money doesn’t necessarily cause a candidate to win but, rather, that the kind of candidate who’s attractive to voters also ends up attracting a lot of money.
And it doesn’t seem as if money really causes electoral victories either, at least not nearly to the extent that the conventional wisdom says.
There are a number of US politicians who were wealthy but their money could not tilt the balance of power in their favour.
The personification of this proposition includes politicians such as Meg Whitman, Linda McMahon, Steve Forbes, Howard Dean and many others.
American business executive and politician Meg Whitman is the chairwoman, president, and chief executive officer of Hewlett-Packard. Whitman was early in her career touted as a potential US female president. In February 2009, Whitman contested the governorship of California as the fourth wealthiest woman in the state of California with a net worth of $1.3 billion. She spent more than $144 million of her own money than any other political candidate spent on a single election in American history but lost to a little known candidate.
Further, Linda McMahon is an American professional wrestling magnet notable for her career developing WWE with her husband Vince McMahon. Since1980 when she started business with her husband, McMahon has become wealthy through the WWE’s success. As President and later CEO of the company, she left WWE in 2009 to run unsuccessfully for a seat in the United States Senate from Connecticut, losing to Democratic Party nominee in the general election of 2010. McMahon was again the 2012 Republican nominee for Connecticut’s other Senate seat to replace retiring Senator Joe Lieberman in the general election in November 2012, but lost again to a little known candidate.
In addition, Steve Forbes is an American publishing executive who has lost twice as candidate for the nomination of the Republican Party for president in 1996 and 2000. He is the editor-in-chief of business magazine Forbes. He is the son of long time Forbes publisher Malcolm Forbes and the grandson of that publication’s founder, B.C. Forbes.
Meanwhile Tom Golisano is an American businessman and philanthropist. He is the founder of the second largest payroll processor in the United States and former co-owner of the Buffalo Sabres hockey team and of the Buffalo Bandits lacrosse team. He is a founding member of the Independence Party of New York and ran unsuccessfully on its ticket for governor of New York in 1994, 1998 and 2002. He spent a combined $93 million on the three campaigns.
The situation was similar to the 2008 US presidential elections where Hilary Clinton was busking in huge millions of dollars while Barrack Obama was stringing up little finances and managed to upstage Clinton to the Democratic Party presidential candidacy and eventually won the US presidency.
Similarly, Zambia has had wealthy candidates before such as Zambia Republican Party (ZRP) leader Benjamin Yoram Mwila or BY. BY had an aggregate of wealthy that was unequalled at some point in Zambia. In the 2001 general elections, he mounted an extensive campaign after falling out with MMD during the third term debate. At some point, BY could spend months in villages meeting prospective voters, sleeping in huts and aggressively lobbying for votes. When the results were announced, late president Levy Mwanawasa triumphed while Anderson Mazoka was runners-up and BY was almost at the tail end.
Further, in the just ended January 2015 by-elections, PF candidate Edgar Lungu struggled to mobilise campaign resources while UPND candidate Hakainde Hichilema was a recipient of huge financial support from suspicious foreign businessmen. Hichilema had run a campaign that had no financial interruptions yet he succumbed to Lungu whose campaign was poorly funded.
Perhaps, this confirms the Levitt’s research findings that suggest that money does not necessarily cause a candidate to win but, rather, that the kind of candidate who’s attractive to voters also ends up attracting a lot of money.
Now, how far can a coalition of millionaires in Geoffrey Bwalya Mwamba or GBM, Hakainde and cartel financier, also Finance Bank proprietor Rajah Mahtani go?
The post How Much Does it Cost to Buy the Zambian Presidency? appeared first on Zambia Reports.
The multi-millionaire banker Rajan Mahtani has allegedly issued an ultimatum to the United Party for National Development (UPND) that they must part ways with their newly appointed Vice President Geoffrey Bwalya Mwamba (GBM) if they want to receive campaign funding from him, a well placed source tells Zambia Reports.
