Tracking duplications in Kasaija’s budget

Mr Kasaija will also defend the integrity of his sixth-year- budget as Finance minister, and shed light on reports that the budget document with duplications, was a handiwork of “mafias” in his ministry.

The committee has discovered that the Finance ministry budget contains Shs9.6 billion earmarked for procuring, coordinating, supervising and monitoring Ministry of Health and fitness activities, football, athletes, netball, volley ball, swimming, chess and other games. These activities, however, fall under health and education sectors.

The MPs on the Budget Committee have also questioned an additional Shs9.6b that the Finance ministry wants to plant trees, donate scholastic materials to needy students, support expectant mothers, conduct radio and TV talk shows, paints Zebra crossings and install traffic signs.

“They have now given themselves almost Shs10 billion to do what should have been done by Ministry of Transport and Works that is installing traffic lights signs, painting Zebra crossing. Now what will the Ministry of Transport do?” Mr Richard Okoth Othieno (West Budama North) asked.

The ministry officials also allocated themselves Shs57b to review and update sector grant guidelines for 2020/2021 to prepare and implement a thematic performance improvement plan for micro-scale irrigation. Irrigation falls under Agriculture docket. 

Duplications

Several outputs under the Finance budget appear duplicated and have same amounts allocated to non-wage and wage items.

The outputs in the ministry budget documents to Parliament, however, have different activities which are now a subject of the Budget Committee investigation.   

Daily Monitor scrutiny of the documents indicated that non-wage for ministry support services, amounting Shs9.6b appears 25 times with the same amount attached on each; human resources management with an allocation of Shs5.3b each, is appearing 21 times.

Accountability sector, secretariat services has Shs3b and appears 18 times while gender equity and environment coordination (Shs438m each) appears 11 times among others.     

Mr Jim Mugunga, the Finance spokesperson, said there are no mafia in the ministry” and explained that the ministry during the budget preparation, and presentation season, has as a tradition, to undertake some multi-sectoral outreach activities to draw attention to the process, engage the public but also undertake real-time grassroots based community activities.

“This awareness exercise is a seasonal practice and not a duplication or replacement of mandate of sister ministries, departments or agencies. Indeed, the ministry formally presents these activities in a Ministerial Policy Statement to Parliament, and is publicly accessible on our website.

 “It is regrettable that the information presented lacked clarity and some of it was applied out of context. As promised, I believe the ministry leadership will engage and deliver the much needed clarification to Parliament tomorrow (today) or as soon as permitted to set the record straight

Minister blames technical error

Responding to members concerns on Tuesday, State minister (planning) David Bahati said: “It is clear that when you look at the presentation of this system, if you have not gone through it, you might misinterpret it.”

 The MPs, however, told the minister that their concerns were all written in the Ministry of Finance documents to the committee.

 Mr Bahati blamed “the technical error” in the budget document, and requested the committee to allow the team withdraw the document and present a clearer copy today. 

“Now that you have some serious questions on it, can we, in the spirit of cooperation and progress, withdraw this document, we go and look at it and give you another document?” Mr Bahati asked the committee.

However, Budget Committee members led by their chairman, Mr Amos Lugoloobi (Ntenjeru) have pledged in-depth scrutiny of all the 2021/2022 planned government expenditures and voiced bipartisan concerns that the distortions in the Finance budget could be prevalent in other ministries, departments and agencies.

 Mr Lugoloobi, Mr Fred Mwesigye (Nyabushozi) and the committee vice chairperson, Mr Patrick Isiagi, among other legislators, rejected duplicated activities in the Finance budget documents, and accused Mr Kasaija’s team of “preaching water while drinking wine.”

 “You [Finance officials] have been telling us that this programme budgeting process is aimed at reducing duplication but we are now seeing wastage, we are seeing you taking over activities you actually do not have expertise in, but there are line entities that can take them over,”  Mr Othieno said.

Although some committee members suspect corruption in the budgeting, Mr Kasaija told the committee recently that cleaning the system “is a struggle because you are not going to clean the society in a day. Those systems are there but those systems themselves get corrupted. The very person who you have sent to catch the thief, joins the thief.”

Shs38b lack details

Sources close to the Budget Committee told Daily Monitor last evening that the Budget Office in Parliament, analysed the Appropriation Bill and discovered that Shs38 billion is not attached to any item in the budget Mr Kasaija presented to Parliament.

The figure is just hanging without expenditure details. The committee has since ordered Mr Kasaija to explain what happened. The Budget office has asked committee members to interest themselves in the Shs38b without details.

 In January, the Budget Committee discovered that officials in the Ministry of Finance had smuggled Shs481b in the budget after the Bank of Uganda (BoU)Deputy Governor, Dr Michael Atingi-Ego, revealed that the Central Bank had not made any request for capitalisation as ministry officials claimed in the documents to Parliament .  “You must recall that in 2018/2019, the capital of Bank of Uganda was impaired by Shs481b, and it was at that time when a request was made to the Ministry of Finance for recapitalisation, and indeed, we got that recapitalisation in early July 2020,” Mr Atingi-Ego told MPs.

He added: “More recently in 2020/2021, the accounts of Bank of Uganda were audited and the big picture is that it made a modest profit of Shs40b and as such, its not requesting for any recapitalisation because the capital is not needed. There is no basis for requesting for recapitalisation.” 

Recommendation

The Budget Committee would later recommend to the Committee of the Whole House to discount the Shs45.658 trillion budget for the next financial year by Shs481b.

The committee concluded that the alleged BoU recapitalisation did not exist as it was sneaked into the Budget Framework Paper without consulting the Governor.

 Budadiri West MP Nandala Mafabi suggested that President Museveni causes the arrest of Ministry of Finance officials, who allegedly smuggled the BoU recapitalisation fund into the budget.

Other lawmakers, who contributed on the matter on the floor of Parliament, did not have any kind words for Mr Kasaija’s team.

In June last year, Speaker Rebecca Kadaga directed Minister Matia Kasaija to explain discrepancies contained in his Budget speech and the National Budget for 2020/2021 approved by Parliament. Ms Kadaga’s directive came after Mr Amos Lugoloobi informed the House that whereas Parliament appropriated Shs400b for payment of arrears owed by government to private sector firms. Mr Kasaija mentioned Shs673b in his budget speech.

 He added that although Parliament approved Shs38.5b towards the export promotion strategy, the minister mentioned Shs138b for the activity. On the roll out of the Social Assistance Grant for the Elderly (SAGE), Parliament approved Shs66b but Minister Kasaija put it at Shs107b.

He also made an error when he mentioned Shs94b as credit allocated to small and medium scale enterprises through Saccos because Parliament appropriated Shs40b towards the same intervention. Parliament had approved Shs100b for talent support, but the minister read out Shs225 billion.