CHIFUNGULA
By MARTIN NYIRENDA-
PILFERING of public funds comes in many forms yet we are bewildered at the depth of the bane.
Mobutu Sese Seko – the former President of Zaire, now Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) – was described as the archetypal African dictator.
Mr Sese Seko presided over his country for more than three decades, a period epitomised by widespread corruption, nepotism, and the embezzlement of US$4 to $15 billion during his reign, as well as extravagances such as Concorde-flown shopping trips to Paris, forget about gross human rights violations.
During his reign, he amassed a large personal fortune through economic exploitation and corruption, leading some to baptise his rule a “kleptocracy.”
Imelda Marcos with her late Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos consolidated their power allowing them to transport funds from the Philippine treasury into offshore accounts, such as those within banks in Switzerland.
Ms Marcos is remembered as a symbol of excess during her husband’s twenty-year rule because of her collection of more than a thousand pairs of shoes.
Despite facing numerous cases involving alleged corruption, her net worth is assumed to be US$5 billion making her the third richest Filipino after Henry Sy and Lucio Tan and the richest woman in the country.
She is well known for her lavish collection of 3,000 shoes including white Pierre Cardin heels which now lie partly in the National Museum of the Philippines and, again partly, in a shoe museum in Marikina.
She was found guilty in September 1993 of corruption by a Manila court and sentenced to 18 to 24 years in prison. She was set free on bail after filing an appeal.
This was just one of around 100 cases involving US$350m allegedly held by the Marcos family in banks in Switzerland. The Swiss federal tribunal ruled in December 1990 that the money would only be returned to Government in Manila if a Philippine court convicted Imelda in a fair trial.
These cases illustrate how public office bearers strangle economies through plundering of public resources!
So, corruption and abuse of office continues to cost countries with the scourge catapulting lack of service delivery and accelerated squalor, poverty and human degradation in a host of communities.
In Zambia, the story is not different. This is why the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is not amused with the rampant misuse of public funds by erring civil servants, sturdily urging Government to act against those found wanting, including those cited for financial irregularities in the 2012 Auditor General’s report.
PAC chairperson Vincent Mwale quips Government should not be lenient on civil servants who abuse public funds by letting them go scot-free.
Morgan Chembo, a business executive of Masala’s Only Fish outlet in Ndola, believes poverty is self-inflicted in the country because most public officers abuse their positions to enrich themselves at the expense of steering the implementation of Government’s development projects, Mr Chembo says in a snap survey that it is cardinal for Government to weed out corrupt civil servants to ensure that its development agenda is realised and benefits the general populace.
“We are always coming across civil servants within our communities who abuse national resources such as using Government vehicles to collect produce from their farms which they later transport to specific traders using fuel bought from tax payers’ money yet people in rural areas travel as long as 10 kilometres to access health care services because there is no transport,” he moans.
Abraham Phiri, a peasant farmer of Soweto settlement in Ndola, quips that abuse of public resources continue to rob peri-urban and rural areas of the opportunity to be beneficiaries of the unprecedented national development taking place in teh country.
“When Government releases money to implement development programmes aimed at improving the welfare of ordinary people, some corrupt public officers charged to implement such projects ‘share the money’ among their peers and families members which denies the majority of people to benefit from Government programmes,” Mr Phiri said.
Catherine Chilombwe, an accountant with a Kitwe based firm, argues that it is universal for most people holding public offices to acquire wealth after working for Government for only few months and this was one symptom of corruption which retards development, adding: “That is why the corrupt civil servants get richer and the poor become poorer. Government should get rid of such people in the system who were in the dirty habit to abuse public funds.”
Ms Chilombwe contends that missing financial records was equally a sign that some people entrusted with Government or company money were cheating and that institutions with poor accounting systems often fail to account for their financial transactions.
Misappropriation of public funds has all the ingredients and potential of strangling development as long as civil servants, including other public office bearers on the sidelines, go amiss in using financial resources prudently.
“It is sad that year in year out, we still continue to see huge sums of money being abused or misapplied by public officers and yet these are funds that are meant to implement projects that can uplift the welfare of our people in communities.
This trend should not be allowed to continue because this country and its people will always wallow in poverty and under-development,” warns Mr Mwale, who is also MMD Chinpangali member of Parliament.
Against this, it is odd that most controlling officers who have so far appeared before the PAC were lamentably failing to provide satisfactory answers on financial irregularities highlighted in the 2012 Auditor General’s report.
Here are but a few graphical illustrations: Education, Science, Vocational Training and Early Education permanent secretary Patrick Nkanza was recently quizzed by PAC over the Milenge Trades Training Institute in Luapula Province where K3 million was paid to a non-existent contractor as advance for construction works.
Auditor General Anna Chifungula wonders how a company, known as Build Trust Construction Limited, was paid K 3m in December 2011 when it was only incorporated in April, 2012.
According to Patents and Registration, the company did not exist yet the contract given to a non-existent company. The contract did not even go to the Attorney General’s office for consent to proceed.
Former permanent secretary Criticles Mwansa and a Mr Yamba, who is believed to have died, have been fingered as people that signed the questionable contract.
The rot is amplified by the misapplication of funds in excess of K 12m in the Ministry of Transport, Works, Supply and Communications meant for infrastructure development which was diverted to procure vehicles and furniture for at a cost of K 7m and K 5m respectively for the new ministers, deputies and permanent secretaries.
PAC questioned Copperbelt province permanent secretary Stanford Msichili why K 4.7m meant for poverty reduction was diverted while Lands, Energy and Water Development permanent secretary Ingutu Suba failed to provide adequate responses to queries raised in the Auditor General’s report on unaccounted for revenue by her ministry.
Ms Suba was also grilled over failure to provide monitoring reports regarding imprests totaling K310,653 issued to ministry officers.
The Southern Province administration kept paying imprest accumulating to K753, 671 in 2012 to officers who had not retired previous payments and K205 883 was issued to 43 officers in 49 transactions as at December 2012 which has not been retired.
Recent exposure of gross financial mismanagement of tax-payers’ money attracts massive public concern.
Civil servants should ensure funds allocated for development programmes are directed towards the purpose for which they are released because the public officers are supposed to be conduits of development as they translate government policies into fruition aimed at improving living standards.
They should perform their duties in accordance with laid down procedures. On the whole, Government must not hesitate to discipline corrupt civil servants whose misdeeds tend to reverse effective implementation of national development projects across the spine of the country.
