State Minister for Planning David Bahati has tendered a UGX910 billion supplementary expenditure request before Parliament’s Committee on Budget, which among others include a UGX60 billion request to procure CCTV cameras for Police.
The government is seeking additional UGX910 billion budget to fund a plethora of its business, including procurement of surveillance cameras for Uganda Police Force. But nearly half of the supplementary budget request has already been spent.
State Minister for Planning David Bahati tendered the nearly a trillion shillings supplementary expenditure request before Parliament’s Committee on Budget, indicating that UGX60 billion would go toward procurement CCTV cameras that the government has recently touted so much as the game changer in fighting rising crime in the country.
The supplementary budget request comes three months to the closing of the current financial year.
Of this supplementary request, UGX419 billion has already been spent, but is now before Parliament for retrospective approval as provided in Section 25(1) of the Public Finance Management Act.
The Act allows government to spend up to 3% of the total approved budget, and table a request for retrospective approval within four months.
The remaining UGX481 billion is, however, above the 3% provision and, therefore, require prior approval by Parliament.
“The ministry appears to have surpassed the 3% request and this needs prior approval by Parliament,