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MEJN rates 2013/14 budget poorly

The Malawi Economic Justice Network (Mejn) said the 2013/14 budget, whose implementation ends on June 30 2014, was characterised by one of Malawi’s worst financial mismanagement at Capital Hill dubbed Cashgate, negatively affecting smooth implementation of the financial plan.

The budget tracking network has also singled out poor delivery of public goods and services such as the availability of drugs in public hospitals as one other characteristic of the 2013/14 budget.

Kubalasa: 2013/2014 budget characterised by poor service delivery
Kubalasa: 2013/2014 budget characterised by poor service delivery

“In our own analysis, we see that some of the 2013/14 budget characteristics include worst donor fund disbursement due to financial mismanagement, worst financial mismanagement or Cashgate and poor delivery of public goods and services,” said Mejn executive director DalitsoKubalasa in the network’s input into the 2014/15 budget which Business News has seen.

Currently, donors are still holding to $150 million (over K60 billion) in budget support for Malawi earmarked for October 2013 to December 2014 quarter after revelations of abuse of taxpayer’s money came to light.

The donor under the Common Approach to Budget Support (Cabs) grouping, include the UK’s Department for International Development (DfID), European Union (EU), Norway, African Development Bank (AfDB) and the World Bank.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Ireland participate as observers.

“We also note that the [2013/14] budget was characterised by improved domestic tax collection, high availability of fuel, moderate availability of forex, high interest rate and declining inflation rate,” said Kubalasa.

On poor record of public financial management, he said the findings of a forensic audit report into cashgate suggest a well-planned and coordinated theft of public resources, degenerated integrity, morality and ethics of public servants.

Kubalasa reiterated the need for civil society organisations (CSOs) to advocate for responsive, accountable and transparent budget going forward.

In the presentation, he classified their input into the budget in the categories of social and economic sectors as well as policy issues.

Meanwhile, government says expenditure and net lending in the 2014/15 fiscal framework has been pegged at K693 billion out of which K181 billion is development expenditure.

Such a figure is K52.7 billion higher than the K640.3 billion revised budget as of December, 2013.

In the first half of the 2013/14 budget, domestic revenue underperformed by K4 billion while grants underperformed by K24 billion.

On one hand, expenditures over-performed by K45 billion while development expenditure under-performed by K27 billion, according to Betty Ngoma, assistant director, debt and aid division in the Ministry of Finance.

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