Africa-Press – South-Sudan. By Yiep Joseph
The Transitional National Legislature in their second reading of the National budget for the fiscal year 2021-2022 withheld the financial bills over citing several errors.
Agak Achuil Lual, Minister of Finance and Planning in February tabled the 287 billion South Sudanese Budget for 2021/2022 to lawmakers from two chambers of national legislature for scrutiny and approval within 45 days.
After weeks of scrutiny by several specialized committees, the 2021/2022 Annual Budget was tabled for the second reading yesterday but the parliamentarian Committee on Finance and Planning led by Changkuoth Bichiock Reth hurriedly requested for withdrawal of the Financial Bill, one of the key bills proceeding the budget bill. Bichiok Reth said that the financial bill contained errors and that more time was needed to correct the mistakes.
“Right honorable speaker, honorable members of the august house, the committee (Finance and planning) scrutinized and analyzed the financial bill 2021-2022 and found out that there are several errors and omissions which required further analysis and schedules, therefore, the committee decided to withheld the bill for more time because the financial bill that was presented to us, there are a lot of pages, a lot of errors, a lot of omissions,” Changkuoth Bichiock Reth said.
“For this, we ask for a few more days to finalize the work. I am happy that the Minister of Finance and Planning is here within the town, then other Ministers concern, the taxation is around because there are a lot of things that are missing within the bill and within one week we can finish” he added.
He said that the budget was already spent and left with a few months to expire. “The budget was presented eight months late to the R-TNL and the quarterly reports were not availed because the budget was already spent. There are only three months left for the FY 2021/22 budget to expire” he said.
In another development, the lawmakers passed the Appropriation Bill, a proposed law that permits the expenditure of government money. it sets some money aside for specific spending and regulates spending.
In his presentation of Appropriation Bill, Dengtiel Ayuen Kuur the Chairperson of Legislation and Legal Affairs Committee recommended that the Ministry of Finance and Planning does not observe budget discipline
“Honorable Speaker and honorable members below are the observations and recommendations after taking into account contributions; the Ministry of Finance does not observe budget discipline, some spending agencies get more than their appropriate budget at the expense of other spending agencies which are deprived of their appropriated budget,” Dengtiel said.
He added that the appropriation figures are still being harmonized by the committee of Finance. He accused some of agencies for refusing to cooperate with the national revenue authority. On her part, Jemma Nunu Kamba the speaker of TNLA promised that the parliament would pass the National Budget by Wednesday.
“Honorable members I think the chairperson’s concern had requested that the next sitting has to be done on Wednesday that is third reading and fourth reading because tomorrow they would like to work on some of the observations and amendments that you have proposed, otherwise they could have sitting tomorrow. For them to incorporate your views they need to be given tomorrow so that they can do that,” Nunu said.
“We meet on Wednesday for the third reading and the fourth reading, we should pass the budget by Wednesday,” she promised.
For More News And Analysis About South-Sudan Follow Africa-Press
