Management of state budget: EU, IMF pressure gov’t to guarantee transparency.

This was the focus of a seminar organised by EU and IMF officials in Yaounde yesterday.

The gathering touched on improving transparency in the preparation and execution of state budgets to ensure that state expenditure benefits the citizens.

The seminar brought together state Cameroonian officials and their counterparts from other Francophone countries.

Speaking at the seminar, the European Union Ambassador and Head of the EU Delegation in Cameroon, H.E Philippe Van Damme, outlined the exigencies that necessitated the come together.

The ambassador recalled that before 2019, Francophone countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, including Cameroon were making significant progress in improving transparency in the preparation and execution of their state budgets.

But since 2019, when the Corona virus pandemic broke out, precipitating a lot of restrictions in terms of movement, face-to-face contacts and social distancing, governments of these countries sacrificed transparency on the altar of crisis management.

Consequently, Cameroon and other Francophone countries have recorded significant regression if not outright stagnation as indicators of transparency not only in budget management but in other sectors of governance.

Whereas, both the EU and the IMF hold this as the central focus of the reforms they want to institute in these countries, the ambassador said.

He expressed dismay that due to the pandemic, the third and fourth editions of this seminar were held via video conference as such, they never made any significant impact in entrenching the value of transparency and effective control in both state budget preparation and execution.

For which reason, the 5th edition now holding in Yaounde, has a tall agenda. H.E Van Damme said the only way to guarantee transparency is to institute and beef up internal and external control mechanisms.

He said one form of internal control being the effective functioning of internal audit systems, this being supplemented by periodic external auditing.

For external control, the ambassador called for the involvement of civil society not only in the preparation, but also in the monitoring of how state budgets in these countries are executed.

He said civil society organisations need to be equipped with the right manpower so that they are able to effectively carry out this monitoring and control functions for the benefit of the wider population.

The EU ambassador and head of delegation assured that internally generated revenue of the state could improve significantly if transparency was made the watch word of governance.

He recalled that the EU is a major contributor to budget support in these countries, reason why it and the IMF want to see transparency made the watch word in both state budget preparation and execution.

The ambassador went down to specifics by stating that the EU spends some 1.4 billion Euros, to provide budget support to Francophone countries in Sub–Saharan Africa every year, reason why it wants to see results in terms of improving living standards of the people, and provision of infrastructure for the benefit of the wider population.

He therefore called on civil society organizations in francophone countries to take the responsibility of monitoring and controlling how state budgets are prepared and executed more seriously.

Enter MINFI boss

On his part, the minister of finance, Louis Paul Motaze, who declared the seminar opened, admitted that the global health pandemic caused a significant setback in governance activities.

As if the pandemic was not bad enough, Motaze said the war between Russia and Ukraine came to make things worse.

He said it has caused major offsets in normal supply chains, which further put pressure on government´s lean finances.

Motaze, however, recounted some measures that the government had taken which he said point to the seriousness of the Cameroon government in wanting to, not only guarantee transparency in budget management and execution, but in other sectors under state control.

He assured the international community that the seminar that was holding in Yaounde, will certainly open new perspectives on how Cameroon and other francophone countries could catch up on the transparency declining issues raised.

Motaze cited the code of transparency and good practice that was put in place by government to encourage state functionaries to embrace this public service value. Adding that the code of transparency and good practice had since been promulgated into a law that guides all public servants in Cameroon.

He also cited the budget preparation calendar that the government had instituted which the minister said, is also meant to beef up transparency in the management of state activities including budget control and execution.

The MINFI boss ended by assuring international donors and other partners that by the time the seminar ended, appropriate recommendations would have been arrived at to make sure that transparency in managing and executing states budgets not only in Cameroon, but in other sub-Saharan francophone countries would have been guaranteed.