Treasury stalls devolution projects: AG

NON-DiSBURSEMENT of devolution funds has led to failure by local authorities to undertake or complete several development projects, acting Auditor-General Rheah Kujinga has said.

According to a Value for Money Audit Report on monitoring of devolution funded projects by the Local Government and Public Works ministry, local authorities across Zimbabwe are failing to complete projects funded by the devolution funds due to non-disbursement of allocated funds, non-monitoring of the projects and undertaking of unapproved projects.

The special audit, according to Kujinga, was motivated by huge budget allocations and media reports which reported differing views on whether devolution funds had undeniably assisted economic development of communities.

It also sought to assess the extent to which the Local Government ministry was monitoring on whether the devolution funds had been utilised to develop communities in an economic, efficient and effective way.

Treasury allocated more than ZWL$23 billion from 2019 to 2021 but disbursed just ZWL$2 billion, although the amount increased from ZWL$700 million in line with increases in the national budget.

“Local authorities utilised the funds in construction of projects including clinics, schools, sewage systems, boreholes in order to economically empower their communities,” Kujinga said.

She said the review of budgets and disbursements reports revealed that allocation and disbursement of devolution funds commenced in 2019 with analysis showing that for the period under review, discrepancies between budget allocations and amounts disbursed ranged from 6% to 94%.

“Non-disbursement of funds was due to non-release of funds by Treasury. The correspondences availed to audit indicated that the MLGPW [Ministry of Local Government and Public Works] was inundated with letters from local authorities of contractors threatening litigation due to non-payment of invoices,” Kujinga said.

She said the ministry was unable to avail audit work plans and monitoring reports on implementation of devolution-funded projects with officials revealing that they were unable to conduct scheduled monitoring programmes of devolution funded projects.

Kujinga said officials indicated that they were unable to conduct scheduled monitoring visits as funds for that purpose had not been budgeted for.

“Audit was availed with an ad hoc investigation report that was conducted by the ministry on nine local authorities in 2020,” she said.

Kujinga also noted that operational grants that were allocated to provinces and districts to use in monitoring devolution projects were not disbursed.

“To the contrary, board fees were being disbursed although they had not been allocated or budgeted for. It was revealed that the operational grants were not being released as there were no provincial councils who are supposed to utilise the funds.

“Management highlighted that PCs [provincial councils] will only be in existence once the Provincial Councils and Administration Amendment Bill had been signed into law,” she said.

The audit, according to Kujinga, noted that although the councillors were being paid board fees, there were no minutes to provide evidence that they had been doing any devolution-related activities.

Ministry officials revealed that the councillors had not yet been sworn in as the legal instrument had not yet been signed into law.

She, however, said projects that councillors wanted undertake using devolution funds should be submitted to councils during planning and budgeting at the beginning of each year.

The ministry, Kujinga said, should monitor to ensure that projects started first in a constituency are completed before embarking on new projects.

“Due to inadequate monitoring, audit noted that procurement for devolution funded projects were in some instances not being done in accordance with procurement regulations,” she said.

“The non-availability of a legal instrument to provide appropriate mechanisms and procedures had negatively affected coordination between the Ministry and other key stakeholders.”

Kujinga said the ministry could improve on efficient and effective implementation of devolution funded projects by monitoring of devolution funded projects, checking whether local authorities are utilising disbursed funds on approved and budgeted projects and ensure that devolution funds are released when procurement processes have been done and the funds are ready to be utilised.

She also called for the separation of devolution funded and other financial reports while making constant follow-ups to expedite the enactment of Provincial Councils Administrative Amendment Bill into an Act of Parliament.-newsday