Only senior govt officers to buy pool vehicles
Only senior govt officers to buy pool vehiclesBy Moses Kuwema
Wed 12 Sep. 2012, 10:09 CAT
PERMANENT secretary at Cabinet Office in charge of administration, Annie Sinyangwe says only senior government officials will be sold government vehicles next year. In an interview yesterday, Sinyangwe explained that not all the government pool vehicles would be sold.
"The government is not selling all the vehicles and not to everybody. They are only selling to their members of staff who are falling in the categories of one to three, this is the general salary scale and these are directors, assistant directors and some chiefs who fall in that category. This is because these have already been given fuel allowances on their pay slips. That's where the saving issue is coming in. And the selling of these vehicles is to them, not to anybody outside government, no! It's only to these people who are already working in the government so that they take care of the management of transport. If we give you fuel and money for servicing a vehicle, we can as well sell it to you so that it becomes yours," she said.
Sinyangwe said the government would still remain with pool vehicles that would be carrying out general activities.
She said the government would further give the people that qualify to buy the vehicles resources that they would be using to service the vehicles.
"It means it is your vehicle but you are using it for government work. Government is supporting you on your salary with the fuel allowance as well as allowance for servicing. But for this year, we will just go with what we have already been given, which is the fuel allowance. Allowance for servicing vehicles will come next year," she said.
Sinyangwe said with the new measures, Cabinet Office had cut down its expenditure on fuel to 50 per cent.
"On general administration in the past, we had been spending close to about K150 million and we have cut down 50 per cent on fuel expenditure. Because of this measure that we have put in place where staff are not picked and dropped….the fuel that we were using on these various vehicles, like literally all the pool vehicles on the move, has been cut down. After 17:00 hours every driver would pack except those doing emergency works, so that's where the saving is," she said.
On out-of-town government assignments which require a large delegation to travel, Sinyangwe said: "Those will still continue. If there are out of town assignments, the permanent secretary should give authority to an officer."
Asked how many vehicles the government intended to dispose of, Sinyangwe said that would depend on how many people would qualify.
And Sinyangwe said imprest on fuel was no longer there.
"The fuel imprest is got according to a formula whereby distance is calculated against the litres that are required and that's the amount of money a person is given together with the vehicle and the allowance that goes with that kind of trip. It works out to be cheaper on the government side, meaning that we are serving on fuel matters in that area," said Sinyangwe.
posted by MrK @ 4:40 PM
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