K900bn from 2007 budget not spent, reveals Chibiliti

K900bn from 2007 budget not spent, reveals Chibiliti
By Chiwoyu Sinyangwe
Wednesday January 02, 2008 [03:01]

SECRETARY to the Treasury Evans Chibiliti has revealed that about K900 billion of the budgeted money in last year’s budget has not been spent. And Chibiliti said the treasury was working out modalities of expediting budget implementation to accelerate execution of developmental projects.

In an interview in Lusaka, Chibiliti attributed the slow budget implementation to what he called structural deficiencies orderliness which shortened the implementation cycle. “What that means is that because of this underutilisation, we can’t build more schools, construction of the roads and repair of bridges cannot be undertaken on time, hospitals cannot be attended to on time,” Chibiliti said.

Chibiliti said the huge chunk of the money was kept at the Bank of Zambia while the rest of it was with the commercial banks.

“About 600 billion to 700 billion is still with the central bank while K200 billion was with the commercial banks,” Chibiliti said.

He said the current government expenditure cycle was short and that the treasury was working out modalities to ensure that controlling officers in the ministries expedited implementation of the budget programmes by starting expenditure earlier than the current trend.

“Just look at budget system, Parliament only approves it at the end of March when we are already three months into the year and for the treasury to release the money to various ministries, it would take maybe another three months, so the controlling officers only get the money and start spending in June when we are half way in the year,” Chibiliti said. “And in this country our tender procedures take about 90 days, so when it comes to the actual implementation some of these projects, it somewhere in September.”

He said the treasury was currently implementing reforms that would enable controlling officers to start implementing budgeted programmes almost immediately after Parliament approved the budget.

“The problem is that controlling officers only want to start spending when the money is in their accounts,” he said.

Chibiliti also revealed that the treasury had worked out a modality that would ensure speedy implementation of next year’s budget.

He also revealed that the treasury had already finished preparing this year’s budget and had already informed controlling officers in all the ministries of their expected allocations in next year’s budget, a move he said would enable the officers to prepare in advance as they await approval of the budget by Parliament.

“Hitherto, we used to experience this problem, but now it is crystal clear as to where we were getting it wrong. Now, I am optimistic that the greater part of this year’s (2008) budget would be implemented,” said Chibiliti.

Recently, most stakeholders have bemoaned the low budget execution in the country.
During the first half of last year, the government ministries and departments were reported to have spent less than was budgeted and less than was released by the finance ministry.