Decentralised waste?

Tuesday, 29 December 2015 00:01 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Under the latest Budget proposals, all members of Parliament are expected to be given Rs. 15 million each, which adds to an impressive chunk of change of Rs. 3.3 billion, to undertake development activities in their respective electorates. However, given the track record of local politicians, monitoring these funds and ensuring they are used for the benefit of the public could prove to be a mammoth task.

Decentralising Budgets are considered to be important because of the difficulties of top down development where the needs of the people on the ground get dismissed because of political interests. In the past few years, many complaints have centred on this form of mega projects that are implemented without due compensation and regard for residents. In many instances, development was done by sacrificing personal property and large amounts of money were spent on projects that brought little or no returns. Saddled with these white elephants and the hefty repayment of their loans, the idea of decentralised development sounds even more attractive.

The logic of provincial level development is that it gives the people of the area ownership of the projects and they are directly benefited by the results. However, in Sri Lankan municipalities, local governments and provincial councils are often calcified under red tape and often lack the expertise to gather data and implement development projects. In addition, political involvement usually undermines the power of officials and their ability to work independently.

For any average person, the biggest fear is that politicians will use the money simply to their advantage and much of the cash will be wasted because it will be focused on political supporters rather than larger integrated projects aimed at economic development. Even though the Prime Minister’s office has insisted 70% of the budget should be directed towards infrastructure projects and have called on project proposals to be submitted before the money is distributed, concerns of governance remain.

Another common practice is to start projects and stop them halfway or even after the plaque has been set up and there is no follow up or accountability as to what happened to the money. Such oversights have taken place for years and even the new Government has failed to actively respond to such instances of wastage and mismanagement, even when it is spelled out in the report the Auditor General’s Department presented to parliament last week.

Doling out cash in relatively small instalments to 225-odd representatives also means tracking it becomes that much harder and Sri Lanka’s anti-graft institutions are woefully ill-equipped to deal with the consequences. With so much money funnelled to hundreds of projects the chances are for the funds to vanish with little attention being paid to evaluate their impact on true development.

Projects that take up money but do not contribute to actual growth can be ill afforded by the Government straining to manage its revenue and expenditure. The Government has to repay an estimated $ 4 billion in loans and interest payments before the end of next year. In such a climate Rs.3.3 billion cannot be wasted, especially by a Government that claims to worship the principles of democracy.