Maravi

‘Withdrawal of funding has affected RDA’

‘Withdrawal of funding has affected RDA’
By Ernest Chanda and Mwala Kalaluka
Fri 07 May 2010, 03:40 CAT

ROAD Development Agency (RDA) director Erasmus Chilundika yesterday told the parliamentary committee on estimates that the withdrawal of donor funding to the road sector has affected the rate at which the agency can perform.

Responding to a question from Kabwata Patriotic Front (PF) parliamentarian Given Lubinda who wanted to know why the Auditor General’s report on the road sector presented to President Rupiah Banda has not yet been presented to Parliament and if it were true that the contents of the report had led to donors withdrawing funding from the sector, Chilundika admitted that there were errors highlighted in the report.

The committee is chaired by Bweengwa UPND parliamentarian Highvie Hamududu.

“With regard to the standoff with the cooperating partners, you will recall that a number of cooperating partners had issued statements in the press where they were saying that they had suspended funding to the road sector until the issues that had been raised by Auditor General are resolved.

Now where we are the audit is complete, the draft final has been submitted to the ministry, we have reacted to it. And we are expecting that this document will be presented to the parliamentary public accounts committee as the law requires. And it’s only really after that that we will be in greater position to be able to speak into the details of that audit,” Chilundika submitted.

“But what we are doing now, because we are a sector that requires a lot of resources and the absence of donor funding is affecting the rate at which we are able to undertake works. You will recall Honourable members of parliament that we did mention in our presentation of the budget the other year and last year that we are working with the EU in Central Province and North Western Province by way of sector budget support.

Now those monies have dried up and yet there’s a lot of need in those two provinces where they committed to work with us. We’ve looked at the audit heads and we have developed what we are calling corrective actions to be undertaken. We do value the audit findings; like any institution there are systemic failures and those issues we are addressing them by way of those corrective actions. And we hope that we should be able to discuss this matter and bring it to a conclusion.”

And former works and supply permanent secretary Lieutenant Colonel Bizwayo Nkunika said his recent removal from office had nothing to do with recommendations made in the donor-induced financial audit report on the road sector.

Lt Col Nkunika in an interview described his removal from the ministry as a normal reshuffle.
“It’s just time up. I have been there Ministry of Works and Supply for eight years and we normally are shuffled around. I do not see anything strange in this,” said Lt Col Nkunika yesterday when asked if his removal was connected to the road sector audit. “As far I am concerned I do not see anything strange in this.”

When told that there were further assertions that he asked to be removed so that he focuses on his political interests in Lundazi, Lt Col Nkunika responded in the negative.

But sources said Lt Col Nkunika left in order to get into active politics.
“He wants to go into politics because even the issue of new permanent secretary Watson Ng’ambi going in as PS we knew it by January,” the source said. “He Lt Col Nkunika was even in Mufumbwe with the President. He is still trying to warm up his seat in Lundazi.”

However, the source said it would be speculative to connect Lt Col Nkunika’s exit from the Ministry to the donor-induced audit in the road sector.

“People are just speculating because the report has not been released. It is still with State House and it has not yet been released,” the source said.

The Auditor General’s office last year constituted a team of auditors to probe concerns by the donor community on the K1.5 trillion over-procurement of projects by the Road Development Agency (RDA) in 2008.

Donors funding the road sector queried the Road Development Agency (RDA) to substantiate why it over-procured projects by more than K1 trillion in the 2008 annual work plan and a partial halt of donor funding to the road sector was effected awaiting the RDA’s explanation.

Lt Col Nkunika, who was still in office then, said the above over-procurement query was in a way a misunderstanding of the process of procurement.

Labels: ERASMUS CHILUNDIKA, GIVEN LUBINDA, HIGHVIE HAMUDUDU, INFRASTRUCTURE, RDA

posted by MrK @ 3:05 PM