Maravi

Culpable constituencies to forego CDF

Culpable constituencies to forego CDF
By Nomusa Michelo
Tuesday September 18, 2007 [04:00]

LOCAL government minister Sylvia Masebo (above) has said her ministry will soon reveal which constituencies will not receive Constituency Development Funds (CDF) for their failure to account for previous allocations. In an interview last week, Masebo said the ministry was currently looking at books of accounts for constituencies to see which ones have not accounted for the K60 million CDF they received last year.

“The books of accounts as relates to CDF are being looked at, and we will inform the public at an appropriate time as to which constituencies, if any, will not receive their CDF because they failed to account for their previous allocation of K60 million,” Masebo said.

And responding to complaints from some members of parliament that the K200 million CDF was inadequate to undertake meaningful projects, Masebo said the increment from K60 million to K200 million was a significant increment especially if prudently applied.

“Now the point that the K200 million is too little I think is neither here nor there, because if you were receiving per constituency in one civic year K60 million and that K60 million is increased to K200 million, only a normal person will see that it is a big increment even in terms of budgetary allocation,” she said.

“Speaking for myself as minister responsible, the increment from K60 million to K200 million is meaningful especially if applied properly.”

She said instead of looking at the amount of money, people should be concerned with how it could be applied.

“When you go to some of these constituencies and try to find out how the last allocation was applied, people will tell you that they have not seen that money, not because the money is little but because it has not been applied effectively or on projects that are sustainable,” she said.

“If you are going to use the money to, say, improve the water supply to a clinic which has no water, obviously the people in that area will indeed say that their lives have been improved.”

Masebo challenged members of parliament to stop grumbling, saying they were part and parcel of the decision to allocate K200 million per constituency.

“We are coming from a background where this money was being shared in the past years, so at least for now we have put in place guidelines and mechanisms that will reduce any attempt by anybody to misapply these funds,” she said. “We need to improve in the manner that we manage these funds.

We need to improve in the manner we come up with projects. The question of increasing the amounts does not arise.”

Labels: CDF, LOCAL GOVERNMENT, SYLVIA MASEBO

posted by MrK @ 6:27 AM