Zambian debt relief monitors have raised concerns over alleged irregularities in spending on poverty relief under the donor-supported Highly-Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative.
The independent HIPC Tracking and Monitoring External Team, investigating the use of the funds saved under the debt relief programme, identified alleged abuses involving top civil servants in a report released last week.
The team was established by the Ministry of Finance in 2001 to investigate the disbursement of funds in the Copperbelt and Northern provinces.
As a “least-developed” country, Zambia qualifies for the HIPC debt-reduction programme of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.
According to the Minister of Finance, Ngandu Magande, at the end of 2002 the country had saved around 97 million dollars as a result of HIPC, of which about 21 million dollars had been spent as required on social welfare programmes.
But the team found that at least two road repair contracts were awarded to companies in which senior civil servants had interests, while another road repair contract in the Kalulushi district in the Copperbelt province was apparently awarded to a company run by the husband of a provincial procurement officer.
The monitoring teams report noted that “there was undue influence from politicians on the appointment of some road contractors … furthermore, some members of the tender committees took advantage of their positions and got involved in “insider dealings” and thereby awarded themselves contracts through their “fronts” – companies owned by their relatives or friends”.
The Northern Province had used more than 156.000 dollars of the HIPC funds on salaries and fuel, and for festivals and political celebrations. A greater part of the social welfare grant allocations “had not reached the intended beneficiaries, and the social welfare officers either absented themselves or failed to provide records on recipients”.
Several million Zambian kwacha had been diverted to non-HIPC programmes by the Copperbelt province.
Jack Jones Zulu of the Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection (JCTR), who sits on the eight-member monitoring team, pointed out that the findings were not any different to their report for last year on the disbursement of HIPC funds in the Central and Lusaka provinces.
– This is the second time we have identified the abuse of the HIPC funds by senior government officials, said Zulu. According to him, no action was taken against the erring officials identified last year.
– It is pointless identifying the problems, when nothing is done to instil confidence in our donor organisations, he commented, and suggested that the team should include cabinet ministers and parliamentarians to enhance its powers to monitor and take action.
The team, which included the Zambia Institute of Chartered Accountants, the Zambia Institute of Marketing, the Economic Association of Zambia, the Civil Society for Poverty Reduction and the JCTR, among other civic bodies, was “toothless” at the moment, said Zulu.
Magande has responded to the findings with the assurance that the government will not allow “the continued misuse and abuse of the scarce resources by the very people who are paid to be custodians … my ministry will strictly supervise the various projects and programmes, and any lapses will be dealt with sternly.”
Kilde: FN-bureauet IRINnews
