By Baraka Bitariho
Uganda is leading the East African region in budget transparency and accountability in a new global survey.
The Open Budget Index (OBI) carried out by International Budget Partnership (IBP), an NGO monitoring public finance across the globe, shows Kenya scored 48 against Uganda’s 62. Nairobi’s place in the rankings was, however, slightly above the global average of 45.
The other East African countries scored lower than Uganda and Kenya, with Tanzania placed 46 and Rwanda 36. Conflict-prone Burundi was not ranked.
Experts noted that though management of Kenya’s public finance has improved in the past few years, it still does not make public some of the budget documents.
“We have certainly performed better since 2012/13 Budget, but we are not there yet. The programme-based budgeting improved the way the Budget is presented but we still can’t link the narrative with what is put in the accompanying tables,†said Jason Lakin, the IBP country manager.
Dr Lakin said there was not enough information on appropriation-in-aid (A-I-A), the money collected by ministries and agencies themselves and spent on their operations without going through the National Treasury.
One of the recurrent problems with A-I-A has been accountability whereby it is sometimes impossible to ascertain whether collection was actually done and if so, how it was used.
The survey released on Thursday was the third to be carried out, with the first one having been done in 2010 and the second in 2012. However, the methodology was changed along the way, making it impossible to compare previous rankings with the latest one.
In the survey, the top-rated country is New Zealand, followed by Sweden and South Africa. These were considered countries with “extensive†information on the Budget.
Countries with “substantial†information on the budget include Brazil. France, the UK, Romania, Germany, Russia and Uganda. Those with limited information included Kenya, Tanzania, Senegal, Pakistan, Ghana, Spain and India.
Sri Lanka, Zambia, Morocco, Rwanda, Nigeria, Angola, Zimbabwe, Albania and Nepal were considered to have “minimal†information while those classified as having “scant†information included Qatar, Iraq, China, Algeria, Chad, Egypt and Lebanon.
OP The East African
Baraka Bitariho
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