Tag: campaign finance

‘Affirmative action’ could get women on ballot
(CNS): Women make up just 26% of Cayman’s MPs, and just 19 of the 58 candidates who ran for office in April were female. The election mission from the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association that watched over the 2025 General Election has suggested introducing affirmative action measures to encourage more women to run for office.

Governor calls for campaign finance reform
(CNS): Governor Jane Owen added her voice to the calls for election campaign finance reform as she delivered the Throne Speech at the annual opening of parliament on Wednesday. Her address provided few details about what the government has planned for the next two years, and the NCFC administration has delayed the delivery of the […]

Police investigating election overspend by PPM
(CNS): The RCIPS has confirmed that they are working with the Elections Office to investigate the overspending by the People’s Progressive Movement on their 2025 election campaign. The party exceeded the legal spending limit for 12 candidates by well over $200,000, as reported by CNS earlier this week. The party has said the breach was […]

PPM breaks law with $220k overspend on campaign
(CNS): The People’s Progressive Movement has admitted breaching the Elections Act, having spent considerably more money than is allowed for the number of candidates it fielded in the 2025 election campaign and could be liable to pay a fine of CI$25,000. In an explanation submitted with the party’s election campaign expenses, PPM officials said that […]

DMS made $200k PPM donation, largest of campaign
(CNS): Cayman-based financial services company DMS was the largest donor of the official 2025 election campaign period, giving $200,000 to the PPM. While it is possible that other donors made larger donations to one or more of the parties before the start of the campaign on 3 March, the law does not require those donations […]

Candidates spent almost $2M on election campaign
(CNS): Cayman’s three registered political parties spent well over CI$1.5 million on the 2025 election, according to the expenses returns published Friday by the Elections Office, with independents adding almost half a million more to the tab. The Progressives spent about $700,000, the most of all the parties, on twelve of its 13 candidates and […]

TCCP raised $200k for elections in just three months
(CNS): The Cayman Community Party raised more than $200,000 to fund its election campaign in just a few months after the new political group was formed, according to Premier André Ebanks, the leader of the TCCP. Ebanks said the party had ended the campaign with a deficit of around CI$170,000, a debt that would be […]

Independents, parties and campaign donors
Political Watchdog writes: Yesterday we watched a political telenovela unfold with the second premier and fourth deputy premier walking into parliament. And some people want to blame this on “independents”. Keen observers of Caymanian politics will know this isn’t about being independent or with a party.

Election returns reveal few political donors
(CNS): The candidates’ financial returns only reveal a snapshot of who gave what to whom during the recent election campaign. The ‘Alliance’, a combination of the Progressives and four independent candidates, reported the most income from larger donors but only cash payments of $5,000 or more have to be declared. The returns show that the […]

The vagrancy of political campaign finance
Ezzard Miller writes: The current Elections Law in the Cayman Islands has very limited provisions for the control of political campaign finance. The law specifies the maximum that a candidate can spend in an election campaign, the period for which expenses must be accounted and reported, and who can incur these expenses.

CPR reaffirms grassroots status
(CNS): Activists behind the campaign for a people’s referendum on the cruise port project have stressed their origins as a grassroots movement, as the premier and deputy premier continue to push the false narrative that the campaign is really a commercially driven opposition to government policy. In reality, CPR is a non-profit organisation formed by […]