EASTERN PROVINCE

KAYONZA — There should be good Public Finance Management in order to achieve development, the Minister of Finance and Economic Planning, James Musoni has said.

Musoni made the remarks on Wednesday, while officially opening a two-day workshop on Public Finance Management systems in the country at Akagera Game Lodge.

The event is being attended by heads of budgetary agencies in different ministries and government organizations.

"We wish to improve public finance management right from the planning process to the implementation phase,” Minister Musoni said.

He said that his ministry has got clear key performance indicators which should be matched with performance based budgeting, public procurement systems, accounting, reporting and internal audit systems in order to be able to serve the public better.

According to the minister, the participants would discuss ways of minimizing delays in paying suppliers. He stressed that there will be no more delays in paying suppliers of government.

"The ministry carried out research and realized that the problem emanates from suppliers who sometimes supply to government without passing through proper channels of the tendering laws,” he said. 

"Another problem is with budget agencies who sometimes delay to submit the invoices to the treasury for payments. So, we want to sort out all these problems and ensure that people who supply to government are paid in time,” Musoni said.

He revealed that since 2006 when reforms in Public Finance Management started, a lot has been achieved.

"We have achieved a lot since 2006. We reformed right from the planning process and set clear targets in line with Vision 2020 and Millennium Development Goals.

We put in place enabling environments like the Organic Budget Law, financial regulations, internal audit regulations, and the public procurement code.”

All these, he added, have improved our financial systems. "We also published Public Financial Systems for 2006 and 2007,” Musoni said adding that Rwanda is ranked among the best five African countries with the Public Finance Management systems.

According to organizers, participants were set to discuss lessons learnt from financials years of 2006 and 2007 and the format of making financial statements.

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