The Civil Society Budget Advocacy Group (CSBAG) has challenged government to have fiscal discipline if it is to deliver services to Ugandans and develop the country at the same time.
This comes at a time when the parliament of Uganda approved a substantial national budget of 72.136 Trillion shillings for the fiscal year 2024/2025, following the passing of the appropriations Bill 2024 on 16/05/2024, indicating a significant increase of over 14 trillion from the initial proposed budget of 58 trillion shillings.
According to CSBAG, out of the approved 72.136 trillion, 37 trillion will be going for debt, and the 34 trillion remaining is for service delivery indicating that, the country’s debt burden is increasing, the country has less money to deliver services to Ugandans which puts it at the risk of being debt trapped, increased interest rates at the cost of borrowing money and therefore there will be less people to borrow us money especially if we don’t control on our appetite to spend on everything.
During an exclusive interview with MS News Uganda, CSBAG’s Executive Director Julius Mukunda noted that, without government fiscal discipline, the country cannot attain economic development.
“Those who are not implementing on time, should be kicked out of office, and we bring the best Ugandans to execute our work, those who are eating money, kick them out and we bring people with integrity to deliver to Ugandans.” He emphasised
Mukunde arged Ugandans to vigilantly participate in monitoring their budget implementation so that they get a wide picture of how money is spent such as budget for school facilities expansion, procurement of construction materials by lower secondary curriculum among others.
However he commended government for the allocation of the 1 trillion for Parish Development Model, 13 billion for Women Entrepreneurship program, 342 billion grant for enhancing for growth and development for women, 8.7 billion towards youth livelihood program, government plans to recapitalise Uganda Development Bank and Agricultural credit facility for farmers with 50 billion, a budget for improving seed varieties for animals and crops with 24 billions for new breeds of animals, 13 billion for animal feed production and another 30 billion allocated for seed certification among others, and encouraged Ugandans to tap into such opportunities for their development.
He expressed the need for government to adopt daily sustainability mechanisms and urged citizens to control government to stop borrowing heavily and begin to live within our means and follow the 2 key areas of raising more revenue and controlling debt in the country, as failure to do this may lead to increased interest rates which greatly affects business growth, it will further reduce the amount of money that we have which will delay service delivery, it will lead to inflation, and the government’s credibility will be greatly damaged.
