Monday, August 08, 2011

MPs kick Defence Minister Crispus Kiyonga out of Parliament over jets cash

Ministry of Defence officials were yesterday thrown out of Parliament following an indication in its ministerial policy statement that Shs1.4 trillion spent on fighter jets was borrowed.

MPs rejected Defence Minister Crispus Kiyonga’s statement that the money is part of public debt to be serviced in future. The legislators say the money was drawn from the Consolidated Fund.

Incurred expenditure
Whereas the ministerial statement did not capture the Shs1.4 trillion, MPs on the defence committee insisted it must be part of the ministry’s budget and captured as incurred expenditure.

If the MPs’ proposal is adopted, the ministry’s budget will become the largest, dwarfing those of education and works—a situation that could attract criticism from donors—who oppose developing countries spending large chunks of their national budgets on defence.

Without the fighter jets component, the defence budget stands at Shs657 billion but the inclusion could send it up to Shs2 trillion. Dr Kiyonga and his team that included Permanent Secretary Rosette Byengoma, Chief of Defence Forces Gen. Aronda Nyakairima, the Joint Chief of Staff, Brig. Robert Rusoke and the Commander of Land Forces, Lt. Gen. Katumba Wamala, were told go back and rewrite the ministerial policy statement to include details of the expenditure on the fighter jets.

The committee’s deputy chair, Mr Simon Mulongo, said Ugandan taxpayers will pay twice for the jets if the expenditure is treated as public debt. “Parliament approved this purchase as an incurred expenditure not a loan. Procedurally, they would need a parliamentary resolution to allow you to borrow but Parliament approved the purchase when the money had already been spent. We will end up with a situation where we pay double,” he said.

Mistake
However Dr Kiyonga said it was a mistake in his policy statement, adding that the purchase was supposed to be under finance not defence ministry. “I’m going to consult with the Ministry of Finance because we had agreed that this expenditure should be counted as their expenditure not ours,” he said. Government bought the jets from Russia this year, causing an uproar, mainly from the opposition that labelled it wasteful.

Source:  http://www.monitor.co.ug

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