CHIFUNGULA

By CATHERINE NYIRENDA-
THE Public Account Committee (PAC) yesterday took to task the Citizens Economic Empowerment Commission (CEEC) for failure to reconcile loan recoveries of more than K4.8 million paid by its borrowers.
The 2012 Auditor General’s report indicated that the amount was deposited in the loan recovery accounts by various borrowers but was not allocated to specified borrowers.
CEEC director general  Likando Mukumbuta who appeared before the Committee blamed Zanaco for the failure to reconcile loan recoveries paid by borrowers.
“Zanaco did not have a proper system in place in that they were not capturing all the details by the borrowers who were depositing the monies.
“The Bank has agreed to help CEEC reconcile the deposits by borrowers by going back to their archives and retrieve all the information from the actual documents the borrowers were using,” Mr Mukumbuta said.
But PAC chairperson Vincent Mwale threw back the blame on the Commission for not having put in place a proper system to manage the repayments of the loans.
“Several University students are paying their fees using the Zanaco systems and other banks but they do not have these problems that CEEC is entangled into, you should have put in place a system and I only hope someone has been held accountable for this,” Mr Mwale said.
Mr Mukumbuta said the commission had since put in place systems to ensure that such eventualities did not recur.
The commission had also separated 14 senior managers replacing them with adequately qualified managers in the vacant structures.
Patriotic Front (PF) Chama North MP Jaunary Zimba flanked by united Party for National Development (UPND) Mwembeshi MP Austin Milambo questioned the role of the director general to be allowing the anomalies and whether CEEC had qualified staff to manage the institution.
Earlier Commerce Trade and Industry Permanent secretary Siazonga Siakalenga told the Committee that CEEC had engaged CYMA charted Public Account and management consultants to undertake a valuation of the commission’s loan books to reconcile all loan accounts.
The committee questioned the irregular payment of car maintenance allowance to the CEEC director of empowerment amounting to K13, 860 despite having been provided with a CEEC vehicle to which Mr Siakalenga said the amount had been recovered from the officer’s terminal benefits.
Auditor General Anna Chifungula disputed that the money was recovered from the named director’s benefits which she said were not sufficient to have such a deduction because at the time the officer was leaving the Commission she got a loan way beyond her terminal benefits entitlement.