In his report, Muwanga says that the revised budget for the Model during the financial year was 234 billion Shillings out of which, 139 billion was released representing 59.4 percent performance.
Auditor
General John Muwanga has highlighted several challenges of the Parish
Development Model (PDM). They range from incomplete baseline data,
implementing entities not provided with resources to undertake the start-up
activities, and diversion of 17.5 billion, 594.7 million Shillings in five Local
Governments among others.
The findings are in his latest audit report on finances released in the last
financial year 2021. Muwanga presented the report to Speaker of Parliament,
Anita Among on Thursday.
The government launched the Parish Development Model (PDM) during the year under
review as a delivery mechanism for transitioning 39 percent of households from
a subsistence economy to a money economy and as a wealth creation programme at
the lowest economic planning unit, the parish.
The model is premised on seven pillars including Agriculture Value Chain
Development, Infrastructure and Economic Services, Financial Inclusion, Social
Services, Community Mobilization and Mind-set Change, Parish-Based Management
Information System and Governance and Administration.
In his
report, Muwanga says that the revised budget for the Model during the financial
year was 234 billion Shillings out of which, 139 billion was released representing
59.4 percent performance.
“I reviewed the government’s preparedness to implement this intervention and noted
the following; Successful implementation of the PDM requires complete and
reliable baseline data. The data collection exercise was supposed to be
undertaken by the Uganda Bureau of Statistics, the Ministry of Information,
Communication and Technology and the Local Governments between 6th June 2022
and 31st July 2022. By the time of writing this report in December 2022, only
41 percent of the expected data had been collected,” says Muwanga.
The Auditor General says that the data should have informed the selection of
beneficiaries, and would be used for future performance reviews and impact
assessments. Muwanga also queries that five implementing entities including
the Ministries of Agriculture, Health, Water, Education and Works were not provided
with resources for undertaking start-up activities. The money was meant for
activities like the selection of enterprises for each parish, formation of parish-based commodity clusters, identification and prioritization of social services
at the sub-county and district level, and development of a strategy for upgrading local
markets.
“As a
result, these activities were only partially done using resources provided
within the approved budgets of these entities which were inadequate. This
affected preparedness to fully roll out the PDM intervention” reads the
report.
Regarding
disbursed funds, Auditor General says that the money was meant to fund
administrative activities, recruit parish chiefs, purchase gadgets and tools
and fund SACCOs without accompanying with guidance on funds utilization.
“I note that
the guidelines or directives were later issued towards the end of the financial
year after funds had been released. In addition, the guidance was at times
contradictory,” he notes.
Muwanga reports that 17.5 billion Shillings was diverted from the purchase of
gadgets and tools, staff costs and administrative costs to revolving funds in
146 Local Governments without authorization, contrary to Regulation 16(1) of
the Public Finance Management Regulations (PFMR) 2016. He reveals that funds
disbursed to SACCOs varied from one District Local Government to another with
SACCOs receiving amounts ranging from 2.3 million to 17.8 million.
Muwanga also reports that 1,502 SACCOs in 70 Local Governments did not receive
any funding.
“The funding variations were attributed to a lack of accurate data on the number
of parishes and shortfalls in releases. 29.5 billion meant for revolving funds in
49 Local Governments was transferred to 3,214 SACCOs that were neither
registered under the Cooperative Societies Act nor had signed Parish Revolving
Fund (PRF) Financing Agreements,” further reads the audit report.
79.2 billion
Shillings was disbursed by the Ministry of Finance to the District accounts instead
of the beneficiary SACCOs accounts, contrary to Guidelines of the PDM issued in
May 2022 and consequently, five Districts diverted 358 million from the
revolving fund to administrative activities.
Another 79.2
billion Shillings paid to 8,703 SACCOs as revolving funds in 169 Local
Governments remained idle on SACCO bank accounts ad Auditor General Muwanga
says that failure to utilize the funds delays the achievement of PDM objective
of improving community livelihoods.
“I noted irregularities in the recruitment of parish chiefs. For instance, in
Butaleja District Local Government, 15 out of the 39 parish chiefs recruited
had forged academic documents, resulting in the loss of government funds worth 12
million Shillings. PDM funds amounting to 594.7 million in five Local
Governments relating to administrative costs, staff costs and gadgets and tools
were not adequately supported with the requisite documentation,” says the
Auditor General.
Edward Akol,
the Assistant Auditor General presented the figures to Speaker Among.
//Cue in:
“disbursement of funds…
Cue out:… dequately accunted for.”//
The Auditor
General recommended that government fast-track the collection of baseline
data, and the development of the Parish Budget and Management Information System
(PBMIS) for which PDM was designed for implementation.
Muwanga also wants the Ministry of Finance to streamline the processes of
budgeting, release, utilization and accountability for all PDM funds and
coordinate with the PDM Secretariat to harmonize the programme implementation
guidelines.
He recommended that the Ministry of Local Government and the Ministry of
Finance should ensure all disbursed PDM funds are fully accounted for and
that accounting officers should revoke appointment letters of the irregularly
appointed parish chiefs and recover the paid funds.
The Auditor General, however, noted that the government has registered some
achievements in regard to the PDM implementation and these include constituting
a National Policy Committee to give strategic direction for the programme,
setting up a functional PDM Secretariat, publicizing the programme nationwide
and issuing of implementation guidelines.
Speaker Among urged the Auditor General to be more strict on Parish Development
Model funds to ensure that the right people benefit from the programme.
