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Regional govts fail transparency test on budget information

Saturday October 30 2010
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Tanzania government is one of the least open on budget matters

Budget transparency, a prerequisite for equitable distribution of resources and economic growth remains low in East African countries despite modest improvements over time, a recently concluded survey has found.

The Open Budget Survey carried out in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Sudan was based on eight key documents including budget statements and audit reports that governments ought to publish for citizens to follow, and hold them accountable.

The report produced from the survey shows that Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania are rated as only providing “some” information, while Sudan and Rwanda provide “scanty” information.
“Relative to other countries in East Africa, Uganda has made the greatest strides towards budget transparency over the past four years,” states a report written by Uwazi at Twaweza in Tanzania, and International Budget Partnership.

The budget transparency dossier comes at a time when Kenya has changed its budget structure following promulgation of the country’s new Constitution. There will be two vertical and horizontal changes; the Finance Bill will be prepared separately from expenditure proposals unlike in the past when it was the same document.  

Second, there will be a clear distinction between the budget for counties or devolved governments, and the ministries at the centre. Some components of the budget however, namely education, will not be decentralised, meaning proposals and disbursements will be done from the respective ministries.

The news also come at a time when the New York-based Revenue Watch Institute recently released its 2010 index that shows that Tanzania is secretive when it comes to revenue generated from its extractive industries. It ranked the country 37 out of 41 in transparency in that area.

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The Open Budget Survey shows that East African countries lag behind the global average, when it comes to budget transparency, far behind the top performer, South Africa, which provides extensive information on the budget.

Besides perpetuating the culture of ignorance, this creates room for corruption to thrive, considering that the institutions charged with the oversight responsibility such as parliament and the offices of the auditor and controller general, are weak.

“Due to the limited budget information that is made available, it is virtually impossible for citizens in East Africa to hold their governments accountable for the way public money is managed,” the report says.

 Parliament, which would ordinarily play the oversight role, alongside the audit institution, is not strong enough for this.

The survey finds that legislatures play only a limited role in the budget process, with the parliaments in Sudan and Tanzania being the weakest in the region.

Among the reasons for this is the limited time allocated to parliaments to scrutinise budget proposals and lack of sufficient powers to amend them.

When reports from audit institutions, which check collection and expenditure of revenues in a manner that is consistent with the enacted budget and with applicable financial management regulations, get to the floor of the House, there is too little time to adequately scrutinise and discuss them.

Without independence from the executive, inability to select what should be audited, limited resources as well as an inability to report on time, to communicate findings effectively to the public and to follow up on them, makes audit institutions weak.

“Weak oversight bodies are a recipe for waste, misplaced priorities, and, sometimes, outright corruption. Strong oversight bodies on the other hand, require adequate resources, independence and authority for them to do their job,” the report states.
Within East Africa, Uganda is ranked top with highest scores on Open Budget Index, due to its production and publication of all eight core budget reports identified by the survey, including in-year reports, mid-year reviews and year-end reports.

The survey ranks Sudan and Rwanda at the bottom of the scale, not only in East Africa, but also globally, adding that these countries provide only scant budget information to their citizens, publishing only five out of the eight key reports. These documents exist but are not publicly available, except in Uganda.

The survey however find the comprehensiveness of the information produced in these reports wanting. An example is the Executive’s Budget Proposal, which IBP identifies as one of the most important policy and planning documents.

While Rwanda and Sudan do not publish it, Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania only provide three-fifths or less of the information it contains

Nonetheless, the survey’s findings indicate that there has been a gradual improvement over the years in transparency with regard to the budget, However, the figures show that Kenya and Tanzania have slid backwards at some point in recent years.

Thus, this is a call to action for all the East African countries to increase transparency in the budget process.

The budget process in Kenya is already undergoing transformation that should result in increased transparency.

The survey proposes measures that increase transparency, such as making public documents that are already produced for internal government use or for donor agencies.

“Other measures, such as strengthening the role of oversight institutions, parliaments and the supreme auditor institutions may be more challenging, but successful East African examples can provide guidance on how to go about it,” it adds.
Reported by Cosmas Butunyi and David Malingha Doya

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