Under-spending on uplift funds irks MPs

KABUL members on Wednesday said officials of ministries and departments failing to spend less than half of their development budgets allocated during the ongoing fiscal year should be referred to judicial organs.

They said legal action should be taken against departments failing to spend less than 60 percent of their development funds.

The call was issued after the house’s Commission on Finance and Budgetary Affairs presented its report on budge spending during the ongoing financial year that ends March 21.

Mohammad Azam Mohseni, the panel’s deputy head, told the house that according to the report by the Internal Audit and Investigation Department, a number of departments had failed to utilise much of their development funds.

“Funds were made available for 203 projects but the departments concerned did not spend a single penny on them,” he said.

He said his commission had divided the 56 budgetary units into five groups and had considered rewards and punishments for them on the basis of their performances.

He said the lower house should encourage units having spent more than 60 percent of their development funds and had not violated the Finance Law.

Mohseni said departments spending from 45 percent to 60 percent development funds should be named as low performing entities and those spending below 45 percent as inactive.

He said departments having problems in their accounts should questioned and those violating the Finance Law be introduced to the judicial organs. However, he did not name any department.

A number of lawmakers insisted that all those departments and ministries failing to spend much of their development funds should be referred to the justice and judicial organs.

They also said the government should give no room to individuals in the new Cabinet, who had used a small portion of development budgets.

However, first deputy speaker Siddiqui Ahmad Osmani, who presided over the session, said the house could not take a decision on the issue due a lack of quorum.

He tasked the Finance and Budgetary Affairs Commission to prepare a comprehensive report and present it before the house for a decision on Saturday.

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