SAB prevents waste of hundreds of thousands of dinars

Value of govt contracts for 64 days reaches KD 752m

KUWAIT CITY, May 19, (KUNA): Kuwait State Audit Bureau (SAB) said Sunday it prevented waste of hundreds of thousands of Kuwaiti dinars for cancelling a Ministry of Defense’s request to buy a large quantity of sanitizers because the Ministry of Health submitted a similar demand but with lesser prices.

The MoD submitted a request to SAB to purchase 200,000 sanitizers, 500ml size, for 2.950 KD each, but the MoH tabled a demand to purchase the same sanitizers from a local factory but with 880 fils per unit, said Khawla AlHathran, acting director of prior monitoring department for economic affairs.

SAB, she said, informed the MoD about the variation of prices which prompted the ministry to withdraw the request.

SAB, added Al-Hathran, thus prevented the waste of KD 390,000 (USD 1.248 million).

Al-Hathran said SAB was keen on preventing waste of public funds.

Meanwhile, the value of government contracts for urgent cases from March 12 to May 16 (64 days) reached KD 752 million -- about 558 contracts, while the savings from these contracts totaled KD4.1 million, reports Al-Anba daily.

The State Audit Bureau (SAB) studied urgent contracts related to ongoing efforts to deal with coronavirus. The data released by the bureau recently revealed that the number of Health Ministry contracts reached 205 valued at KD221 million, the Ministry of Finance maintained 32 contracts worth KD30 million as it did not sign any new contract, the Ministry of Electricity and Water has 39 contracts valued at KD80 million, the Ministry of Defense has 45 contracts valued at KD41 million, the Cabinet has 37 contracts valued at KD68 million, the Ministry of Interior has 25 contracts valued at KD60 million, the Ministry of Public Works has 36 contracts worth KD195 million, and other agencies have a total of 139 contracts worth KD57 million.

According to the bureau, these contracts are valid for several fiscal years.