The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
By Julius Businge
Development Partners have urged the Ugandan government to improve its governance and anti-corruption efforts to spur economic growth and development.
“Development Partners under the Joint Budget Support Framework broadly support the priorities set out by Government, which include infrastructure development, industrialization, enhanced agricultural productivity, human resource development and public sector reform,” they said in a joint statement issued on March. 14.
Speaking on behal f of Development Partners (DPs) at the National Budget Conference held in Kampala recently, the World Bank Country Manager Ahmadou Moustapha Ndiaye said that weak governance, corruption and fraud must be addressed with a great sense of urgency to increase the quality of services delivered and to allow for a resumption of suspended budget support.
Finance minister Maria Kiwanuka, said government is undertaking measures to strengthen financial controls at the spending agencies; strengthening accountability and anti-corruption institutions and reviewing the legal framework to “make corruption a very risky practice”.
The development partners stressed the need to improve the efficiency of the execution of the national budget.
If the budget is not implemented as stated it will be difficult to perceive it as an efficient tool of economic transformation, they said.
Government is currently handling several cases of fraud in different government ministries which recently led to aid cuts to the East Africa’s third largest economy.
