Electoral commission to assess Nemuno aušra campaign finance breaches

Lithuania’s Central Electoral Commission (VRK) will decide on Thursday whether the Nemuno aušra party and its chairman, Remigijus Žemaitaitis, seriously violated the Electoral Code in financing their 2024 parliamentary and presidential election campaigns, LRT reported.

The commission was due to consider the issue in early July, but postponed it after receiving three requests for a delay. It was postponed again at a meeting in early August after interested companies were given two weeks to submit documents.

In its draft decision, a VRK working group proposes recognising as serious violations cases in which the campaigns were essentially financed with funds from legal entities.

The draft proposes treating 24,200 euros transferred to the party through Robertas Puchovičius by the companies Tvari statyba and Lajota as donations from legal entities to Nemuno aušra’s parliamentary election campaign.

Another 4,500 euros from Tvari statyba, transferred through Puchovičius to Žemaitaitis’s presidential campaign, would also be classified as a donation from a legal entity.

The draft states that Puchovičius financed both campaigns through a third party by acting as an intermediary in transferring the companies’ funds. It also says that Aleksandras Fursas provided funds through third parties, while Lina Šukytė-Korsakė transferred 5,000 euros she received from him to Žemaitaitis’s campaign as a personal donation.

The commission is also expected to consider whether Puchovičius’s brother’s business partner Paulius Kazilionis, his father Edvardas Puchovičius and his wife Eva Puchovič violated the Law on Political Organisations by paying Nemuno aušra membership fees with money received from Puchovičius. The payments totalled 4,300 euros.

The draft proposes finding that Nemuno aušra seriously violated the Electoral Code and the Law on Political Organisations by financing its parliamentary campaign with donations from legal entities and through third parties. The commission will also consider whether Žemaitaitis seriously violated the Electoral Code by financing his presidential campaign through a donation from a legal entity and through third parties.

VRK is expected to consider ordering Žemaitaitis to transfer 9,500 euros in unlawful presidential campaign financing to the state budget within 20 working days.

The proposed decision on the 28,500 euros allegedly received unlawfully by Nemuno aušra would be postponed until the issue of state budget allocations to political parties is resolved. The sum consists of 24,200 euros from legal entities and 4,300 euros in membership fees paid through third parties.

This would be the second serious financial violation attributed to Nemuno aušra. In March, VRK found that the party had misused state budget allocations by renting cars from its leader and a party member in 2024 and paying for the rentals with funds allocated to the party. As a result, the party did not receive its state grant for the first half of this year, amounting to 241,800 euros.