BY GIDEON NYENDWA
GOVERNMENT should not delay releasing funds to schools as budgeted for to ensure smooth operations as learning resumes next week, former Finance Minister N’gandu Magande, has advised.
Mr. Magande said that as schools open next week it is important that funding is released so that no school children are inconvenienced on account of finances.
He said that UPND promised that any child with who wants to go to school should go to school without any hindrance.
“I am expecting that within seven days the money should be released to schools to facilitate the process,” he said.
Mr. Magande said that releasing the money for the schools could be the most important thing the government could do as the New Year starts.
He said that as the New Year starts, the government should work on fulfilling its promises because that was the account on which they were elected.
Mr. Magande also said that the decentralization and utilization of money through the constituencies was one of the most important things that people were looking up to in the national budget.
He said that giving the constituencies that amount of money through the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) was going to expose a lot of members of parliament that had not been working for their people.
Mr. Magande said that those MPs who do not like to supervise the works that go on in their constituencies would be victims because the K25.7 million has to be spent carefully and the MPs have to account for it.
Mr. Magande said already the Auditor general was told that about K64 million was still in the banks unutilized.
