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CSOs, local govt leaders concerned about financial disbursement policies by MoF
By Ceasar Okello
Lira – March 12, 2022: Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and local government leaders in Lira district are appealing to the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development to revise its financial disbursement and revenue remittance policies.
The financial policy requires all the local government in the district to collect revenue and remits it to the Consolidated Funds (CF) account in the Ministry of Finance.
During a dialogue meeting on Local Government Revenue Management at Hotel Good News on March 10, 2022, organized by Consortium of Five CSOs and hosted by Corruption Breaks Crusade (COBRA), participants cried of stringent policies on financial disbursement and returning the money to the treasury.
William Achol Okabo, the Executive Director of COBRA, said that the dialogue was intended to engage local government authorities and CSOs in Lira to share experiences, best practices, challenges and coping mechanisms in local revenue management.
According to Achol, the current Laws, Section 29 Clause 2 (a) and Section 30 Clause 1 of the Public Finance Management Act require all local government entities to collect and deposit all revenues to consolidated account, and to spend per their budget and work plans.
While opening the dialogue, Chemotai James Small, Deputy RDC of Lira district, acknowledged the complaints by CSOs and local government leaders on revenue collections.
Chemotai expressed concern about why the Ministry of Finance always disburse funds late to districts when the financial year is about to end.
He added, “Such monies are always sent back to the consolidated account after the expiry of the financial year and this makes it difficult for districts to take services to the community.”
The Deputy RDC wonders why some people in the government always baptise CSOs who frequently talk about taking service delivery to the people as those “supporting the opposition”. This, he said, is “childish thinking”.
Patrick Abal, a former deputy Chief Administrative Officer (DCAO) of Lira, said: “Those days of our time there was no issue of returning funds to the consolidated account.”
Abal appealed to the technical staff and say they should always stick to their ‘cores of Laws’ to avoid being dragged to court for mismanaging funds.
Patrick Okello, Senior Revenue Officer for Lira district said that collection of revenue in the district has remained a challenge.
Okello said that there is a poor attitude towards payment of taxes by those supposed to pay.
He added that the most annoying part is that there are few revenue bases in Lira district making it hard for them to realize revenue collection targets.
According to him, there is also political interference in Lira where some elected leaders talk negatively against revenue collections, including connivance with revenue collectors to swindle the already collected monies.
While closing the meeting, Lira District LCV Chairperson RCM Okello Orik, called for mindset change by both elected and civil servants if at all they are to realize improvement in revenue collections.
Orik disclosed that most of the revenue bases were all taken to Lira City during the creation of the City.
He blames the past leaders of Lira district for betraying them, saying that they had bad faith towards the people of Lira district.
The angry-looking Orik vowed not to surrender any titled assets of Lira district residing within Lira City.
According to him, he is not ready for any negotiation with Lira City on the titled assets.
RCM Okello Orik cited some assets like Ireda estate, Ngetta Hill, Aler farmland, Lira district headquarters, three sub-county (headquarters) annexed to the City, among others.
