P2.4bn supplementary budget faces Parly backlash
The minister of Finance and Economic Development, Peggy Serame this week tabled a P2.4 billion supplementary budget that immediately faced backlash from Members of Parliament. Proceeds of the funding will go towards covering the procurement of medical supplies, deployment and sustenance of Botswana Defence Force troops in Mozambique.
The funds will be drawn from the Special Funds and approved Domestic Development Fund through reallocation from various slow-moving and non-spending programmes and projects in the development budget.
Serame said the P2.36 billion will be allocated to four ministries namely Finance and Economic Development (MFED), Health and Wellness, and the ministries of Defence, Justice and Security, and Tertiary Education, Research, Science and Technology. While the remaining P134 million is needed to augment the request under the Defence Ministry, the bulk of the supplementary budget – about P1.3 billion – will cover the procurement of medical supplies mainly vaccines and associated medical items.
“The projects, which were supposed to be funded through the Domestic Development Fund are not scrapped, but will continue once they can be spent on,” she explained.
However, the proposed supplementary budget sparked tense debate in Parliament with opposition legislators accusing the government of misusing public funds.
Member of Parliament for Francistown South, Wynter Mmolotsi raised concern against using the development budget as a source of funding, adding it reflects badly on the country. “We are concerned about the continuance of requests, which do not meet the set criteria but have instead become emergencies, owing to either poor budgeting by line ministries or budget management policies by MFED,” Mmolotsi said. “We call for some level of stability in the Health Ministry’s senior management and leadership.” The Leader of Opposition, Dumelang Saleshando said the contradicting statements between the Finance Ministry and the Office of the President regarding the COVID-19 funds could mean they were misused. He said government has also emptied foreign reserves and misused them through the direct tenders that created the socalled COVID-19 millionaires.
“Other countries have built hospitals and medical plants with their funds, which will still benefit them after the pandemic. The Vice President also needs to up his game when it comes to project implementation,” Saleshando said. Other concerns raised included procurement complaints in respect of over-priced goods and services under the Ministry, while the much-needed vaccines have only trickled slowly, despite reported payments and investments.
However, the Auditor-General was urged to urgently complete audits on COVID-19 related expenditure and have the report tabled before Parliament in order to bring accountability and transparency to the whole pandemic response.
Going forward, instead of spending time calling for more and supplementary information, the House warned it will throw out any matter that did not strictly meet the criteria of emergency or unforeseen circumstances and any repeat emergencies out of scope.