The television spots have begun to air, the campaign headquarters have set up shop and the signatures from supporters have been filed. But one question remains: How do Georgia’s presidential hopefuls plan on financing their campaigns?

Tracking campaign expenditures in Georgia can prove an exercise in shadow play. By law, campaigns only have to disclose their sources of financing a month after the final registration of their candidate with the Central Election Commission – in this case, by January 6, the day after the presidential election.

For now, the ruling United National Movement Party and opposition parties interviewed by EurasiaNet were reluctant to discuss their candidates’ funding sources, name donors or project the most burdensome expenses. (The Central Election Commission is expected to release a final list of candidates by December 11).

The most readily available information concerns state funding. Parties that received a certain percentage of the vote in Georgia’s two last elections (4 percent for the 2004 parliamentary elections; 3 percent for the 2006 local elections) are eligible to receive assistance for administrative costs.

Only seven parties have made that cut, according to Central Election Committee data, with financing dependent on the number of votes received: the National Movement Party (144,965 lari or $89,900); the Labor Party (24,848 lari or $15,410); the New Rights Party (24,382 lari or $15,120); the Industrialists’ Party (24,195 lari or $15,004); Republican Party (23,729 lari or $14,715); Conservative Party (23,729 lari or $14,715); and the Freedom Party (20,726 lari or $12,853).

Private citizens can donate up to 30,000 lari (about $18,604) to campaigns, while organizations or companies can contribute up to 100,000 lari (about $62,000).

But the finance manager for one opposition presidential candidate argues that only a few businesses are willing to finance presidential election campaigns to make up the difference in meeting costs.

"We have appealed to 500 businesses to finance us," said Irakli Iashvili, head of New Rights Party Chairman Davit Gamkrelidze’s election fund. "One hundred and fifty claimed that they didn’t get our applications. But only two to three out of the remaining 350 responded to our request."

Labor Party spokesperson Girogi Gugava says that party chief Shalva Natelashvili’s campaign will be based only on the money the party receives from the state budget.

With a nine-party coalition backing his candidacy, parliamentarian Levan Gachechiladze could seem to have an advantage over other opposition candidates. The coalition’s Republican, Conservative and Freedom Parties all receive a total of $42,283 in lari. Rival Davit Gamkrelidze’s campaign is backed by both the New Rights and Industrialists’ Party for a total of $30,124 in lari-denominated state financing.

Nonetheless, like Gamkrelidze campaign finance manger Iashvili, Koka Guntsadze, manager of the Gachechiladze campaign’s election fund, is not optimistic about the chances for finding donors among the Georgian business community.

"How could you ask me questions like this?" stormed Guntsadze. The coalition’s election fund manager argues that "[a]ll businesses are scared and frightened" since those which "dared to finance any opposition party at any time" allegedly saw "their businesses ruined" in retaliation. As does Iashvili, Guntsadze maintains that business support goes to the United National Movement Party’s Saakashvili campaign alone.

"All of us are vulnerable to discrimination during this election campaign and nothing can be done within the framework of the law to ensure the fair treatment of all candidates, to ensure [equal] access to private financing sources," he charged.

United National Movement representatives were not available for comment.

Other candidates expressed similar concerns. Economist Giorgi Maisashvili said that he is counting on his friends to finance his campaign, though declined to name donors before the deadline for filing campaign financial data.

Businesses surveyed adamantly refused to state whether they had made donations to any presidential candidates. "If you tell me a single business which responds that they’re taking part in campaign financing, I’ll give you a comment," stated Nitsa Cholokashvili, a spokesperson for Georgian Glass & Mineral Water, a beverage company recently investigated by financial police in connection with a probe into businesses linked to an equity firm that manages investments for presidential candidate Badri Patarkatsishvili. [For details, see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Staff members for tycoon Patarkatsishvili’s campaign could also not be reached for comment on financing tactics.

For independent political scientist Ramaz Sakvarelidze, though, businesses being "as mute as fish" about campaign donations is par for the course for Georgian elections. "Election campaign financing is a shadowy process and its mechanism hasn’t been subjected to public discussions as of yet," Sakvarelidze commented. "The only visible thing is that the former president Saakashvili promised to increase pensions and finance social programs."

In a December 5 press conference, however, representatives of anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International Georgia and the Georgian Young Lawyers Association argued that these programs constitute an abuse of administrative resources. Saakashvili resigned from the presidency on November 25 to run for re-election, but has continued to make statements widely interpreted as policy directives. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

In the latest announcement, a December 6 televised statement from the campaign trail, Saakashvili pledged that a so-called "cheap credit" state bank will offer "cheap loans for a 10, 20 or 25-year term with interest rates only from 4 to 10 percent."

A new program to provide temporary employment for 100,000 people in December has already gotten underway. Before leaving his post, Saakashvili also increased teachers’ salaries and pensions. Fifty-lari (about $31) gas and electricity vouchers -- reportedly inscribed with "the president’s gift" or "the president’s subsidy" -- have been issued to disadvantaged urban residents; and rural families are set to receive 50 kilograms of flour and five cubic meters of firewood. Meanwhile, war veterans and the blind have been exempted from paying for public transportation.

In a November 19 televised meeting with then Prime Minister-designate Lado Gurgenidze, Saakashvili emphasized that the expenditures are "the right course, but must be done in consultation with the people."

The official explanation is that such outlays will come from the special presidential fund, an extra-budgetary source of revenue intended for emergency expenditures, Transparency International has reported.

But whether or not the presidential fund and a similar, special government fund can handle the expenses is unclear, noted Transparency International Georgia Executive Director Tamuna Karosanidze. The watchdog group estimates that both the presidential and government reserve funds contain 29 million lari (roughly $18 million). It forecasts that the increase in pensions and salaries alone, though, could cost the government 37.7 million (about $23.4 million) in December.

"The president initiated social projects two months before the end of the year, and he has a full right to implement these kinds of projects, but the problem is that he initiated projects which the government found impossible to implement just two-three months ago, " commented Karosanidze. "And neither the budget of 2007 nor the budget of 2008 envisaged financing these projects."