by Tawanda Chiweshe
Government has promised to take strong action against local authorities that do not submit their budgets for approval on time. This was said by the Minister of Local Government and Public Works, July Moyo in a statement.
In a statement issued this week, addressing a number of issues related to local authority budgets, Minister Moyo revealed a number of irregularities. The Minister highlighted that some local authorities were not submitting their budgets on time.
“There are 14 local authorities which are yet to submit their budgets. Of these, Mutasa Rural District Council (RDC), Mutare RDC, Makonde RDC, Mazowe RDC and Hwange Local Board perennially violate the Public Finance Management Act (Chapter 22:19) with regard to budget submissions. In that regard, all local authorities that violate the provisions of the above quoted Act will have to face the wrath of the law,” Minister Moyo said.
The Minister also expressed concern over some local authorities which were not complying with Government’s directive for them to include devolution funds budgeting in their annual budgets.
“The Ministry has also noted that there are local authorities that are not complying with the Devolution Circular and have not budgeted for devolution funds in their annual budgets. Those who do not submit devolution budgets for approval will not receive devolution funding,” the Minister said.
Government was also concerned by local authorities whose unaudited accounts were lagging behind by more than a year. In this respect, the MDC Alliance-dominated Gweru and Harare City Councils were singled out.
“Unaudited accounts lagging behind for more than a year like those of Harare and Gweru City Councils will need assistance to correct the situation, which is a violation of statutes,” Minister Moyo said.
Contrary to some MDC Alliance-dominated local authorities’ claims that Government was taking time in approving budgets, the Minister indicated that over half the number of submitted budgets had been approved as at the end of December 2020.
“As at 31 December 2020, 52 out of 92 local authority budgets for 2021 had been approved. 24 budgets were received in the last 2 days and were still being analysed and should be finalised by the 8th of January 2021,” he said.
Some of the budgets were referred back owning to poor preparation and non-compliance with budget requirements.
“Of the originally submitted budgets, two were referred back due to lack of compliance with either audit or proper budget requirements and these are Kusile RDC and Umguza RDC,” the Minister said.
Government is going to deal with the affected local authorities by assigning officials from the Ministry to assist them.
In view of the poor budget preparations by some local authorities and the increase in the devolution funds being disbursed, Government advised local authorities to employ competent people to handle their finances.
“Due to an increase of devolution funds to local authorities and subsequent increase in capital and infrastructure development, I instruct all local authorities to employ personnel with technical expertise to effectively utilise the disbursed funds,” Minister Moyo said in the statement.
