eBusiness Weekly
Business Writer
Government, through the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development is seeking condonation from Parliament for spending billions of United States dollars beyond budget and without parliament’s approval.
From 2015 till 2018, Government, through various line ministries, has been on a spending spree beyond what would have been budgeted and authorised for, but did not bother to seek approval from Parliament as stipulated in the country’s laws.
The country’s Constitution requires that if a Government Ministry or Department spends money in any financial year in excess of the amount appropriated, or for a purpose for which nothing was appropriated, the Minister of Finance is required in terms of section 307 of the Constitution to cause a Bill condoning the unauthorised expenditure to be introduced in the National Assembly seeking condonation of the unauthorised expenditure, no later than sixty days after the extent of the unauthorised expenditure has been established.
But between 2015 and 2018, Government, through various line ministries overrun their allocated budgets spending billions of United States dollars, and never bothered to seek authorisation from Parliament as required by the law.
Finance and Economic Development Minister Mthuli Ncube, through his ministry is, however, seeking to get condonation for the gross indiscipline and on November 12, 2019 gazetted the Financial Adjustments Bill, 2019.
“ . . . we seek condonation for unauthorised expenditure incurred by line ministries of US$25 million for year ended 2015, US$1,5 billion for year ended 2016, US$4,5 billion for year ended 2017, US$3,5 billion for year ended 2018.”
According to the breakdown of the figures provided by the ministry, the bulk of the beyond budget spending was in the Ministry of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development where
there was a total of US$973 million unauthorised spending.
The same Ministry was at it again in 2017 and 2018 spending US$2,5 billion and US$1,7 billion above budget and Parliament approval.
While no information was provided in terms of what the funds were utilised for, the period 2016 to 2018 coincides with the period where the Command Agriculture Programme was in full swing.
Command Agriculture was an agricultural scheme aimed at ensuring food self-sufficiency that was introduced at the start of the 2016 -2017 farming season following the drought of the previous season.
But from what authorities are on record saying, not more than US$1 billion has been spend through Command Agriculture, which means there are other unrelated expenditure where billions were channelled to.
“Since inception in 2016, the total for Command maize, wheat and soya to the 2018-2019 season is just over $900 million. So when people come here and brand and send in numbers of $3 billion, I don’t know where they are getting that number from, it’s not more than a billion since inception,” Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development George Guvamatanga said in an interview with an online radio station recently.
While Government has also been involved in other agriculture related programmes such as the Presidential Inputs Scheme as well as maize purchase through Grain Marketing Board (GMB), the amounts involved could not be more than what was spend through Command Agriculture, arguably Zimbabwe’s biggest agriculture spend in recent years.
How state funds were utilised under Command Agriculture is on the radar of corruption busting body Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC) with chairperson Justice Loice Matanda-Moyo telling our sister paper The Herald that cases under Command Agriculture, among others, were under scrutiny.
“We have got the Auditor-General’s report, NSSA audit report, Hwange issues, we have got Command Agriculture, we have got so many cases that we are handling at the moment. We have over 200 cases we are handling,” said Justice Matanda-Moyo in July this year.
Parliament has also been asking questions with regards how much was put into Command Agriculture and how the funds could not be accounted for.
