Merit sources are focusing with those accounts or even those top merit rankers in the forum. Merit distribution isn't really that fair and I'm assuming that they are building their own sockpuppets to solo out and milk out signature campaigns that requires accounts that have lots of merit counts.
In my honest opinion, and please note that this is just my personal perspective, I find these claims to be total BS, without any substantial evidence to back them up. Can you show at least one example where you think this happened?
Moreover, there are several topics where you have the option to report posts that you believe haven't received sufficient attention or haven't been appropriately recognized with merits. You can even report them here, and I'm sure that at least some merit sources will take a look and evaluate them.