Finance holds USMID money, chokes cities

Officials from the USMID-AF Secretariat say while the money was promptly returned to the Ministry of Finance when the financial year ended, the ministry has since failed to disburse it.

While appearing before the Parliamentary Accounts Committee (Local Governments), Mr Vincent Byendaimira, the director of physical planning and urban development, said cities, local governments and municipalities implementing the programme are likely to face financial penalties because of the delayed payment to the contractors.

“A total of Shs33b was swept from the cities/municipalities’ accounts at the end of June 2021 and has not been disbursed to the municipalities. These funds constitute part of the contract sums for the signed contracts for the civil works in the cities/municipalities,” Mr Byendaimira said.

Mr Byendaimira said while the local governments through the parent ministry submitted supplementary budget requests for the funds that were moved to the Finance Ministry, the application was rejected on grounds that most local governments were not fully absorbing the funds in the fiscal year 2021/2022.

He asked MPs to compel the Finance Ministry to release funds so that the cities and municipalities can continue with their works.

“All USMID grants that were swept at the end of 2020/2021 Financial Year and earlier periods be verified and the net amounts due to local governments and funds be accessed by the local governments. The cash flow required in addition to FY 2020/2021 budget be authorised through a supplementary budget for local governments in additional cash. This should be case by case. Any cash flow that is not required in the current financial year should be re-voted through the national budget process,” he said.

Mr Byendaimira added that for the local governments whose budget for 2021/2022 is adequate to meet the cash flow requirements, the ongoing budgeting process should cater for the re-voting process to avoid further delays.

“The projection for FY 2022/2023 for which annual performance assessment is ongoing, should instead be appropriated through supplementary budget after determining the actual funds allocated through the annual performance report,” he said.

Other challenges

Mr Byendaimira also said while the programme was designed for municipalities, 13 of them have since been elevated to cities which poses a huge legal challenge in performance assessment.

“...The programme mid-term review is expected to make recommendation on the necessary adjustments on how cities can reap optimum benefits from the programme,” he said.

The director of physical planning and urban development told the committee that the onset of Covid-19 and the subsequent lockdowns also affected the implementation since most consultants were foreigners who were trapped in their countries while those who were present were hindered by travel restrictions. “Nonetheless, designs for priority sub-projects were completed in December 2020 and tender invitation issues,” he said.

Mr Mapenduzi Ojara, the committee chairperson, however, questioned why different rates are quoted for roads constructed under same programme.

“You go to Mbale, the costs per kilometre is different from Gulu, Arua and other towns. Also roads constructed by Unra and Uganda Road Funds have different quotations per kilometre, how do you explain these anomalies?” he asked.

While the team acknowledged that there are variations, they requested for more time to submit written answers.

They are expected to appear before the committee next week.

Achievements

Mr Vincent Byendaimira, the director of physical planning and urban development, noted that under the first phase of the USMID programme, a total of Shs398.5 billion was disbursed to the14 implementing municipalities. About 83 percent of the funds went to the municipalities while the remaining percentage went to the Ministry of Local Government for coordination, capacity building and other interventions.

Mr Byendaimira said a total of 1,327,100 people benefited from the infrastructure sub projects under USMID.

He also said 110 urban roads totaling to 78.4kms were constructed in 13 municipalities between 2013 and 2018. Others included construction of approximately 93.2km of covered line drains and 30.3 uncovered drains, 100.2km of pedestrian walk lanes, 21.8km of bicycle lane and 43.5 km of park lanes.

A total of 2,807 solar street lights were constructed alongside 1,114 street trash cans and signalised traffic lights in Mbale. Three taxi parks were completed in Arua City, Tororo and Entebbe Municipalities.

“The first phase of USMID was the most highly rated World Bank supported programme in Uganda. All the 11 World Bank implementation missions rated the programme highly,” Byendaimira said.

[email protected]