BUJUMBURA July 26th (ABP) – The Cabinet met on Wednesday July 20, 2022, under the chairmanship of the Head of State Mr. Evariste Ndayishimiye. Among the items on the agenda is the budget commitment ceilings for the first quarter of 2022/2023.
Through a press release released on July 21, 2022, by the Secretary General of the State and spokesperson Mr. Prosper Ntahorwamiye, it is pointed out that the commitment ceilings constitute an essential tool for regulating expenditure.
For the 2022/2023 budget year, these commitment ceilings are in line with the annual work plans and budget (PTBA) of the ministries or institutions and the State cash flow plan. Those commitment ceilings concern all categories of public expenditure.
To that end, during the 2022/2023 budget management, the rate of expenditure commitment will depend on the rate of revenue collection. A forecast of FBu 5 billion in excess of the quarterly commitment ceilings of ministries or institutions is planned to deal with emergencies.
For the first quarter of 2022/2023, revenue is estimated at 435.8 billion BIF while expenditure is estimated at 517.98 billion BIF. As regards the financing of this deficit of 82.1 billion BIF, the government will resort to issuing treasury securities. It will also use the reserves of companies in which the State holds shares. Following the analysis, these ceilings were adopted.
During the said Cabinet meeting, a note on the reform of the national social dialogue committee (CNDS) was also analyzed. As specified in the press release, the CNDS is composed of 7 government representatives, 7 employers’ representatives and 7 workers’ representatives. The number of staff is far from sufficient for an effective and satisfactory performance of the missions entrusted to the CNDS. Actions have been taken to raise it to the rank of a national council. In that way, it could be provided with sufficient human, material and financial resources to carry out its missions.
That note proposes the steps and procedures to be followed to elevate the CNDS to the rank of a national council, like the other national councils already provided for by the constitution. After the analysis, the Council of Ministers did not consider it appropriate to elevate the CNDS to the rank of national council, but it will be granted the means necessary to function properly.
In other matters, the Minister for the Environment, Agriculture and Livestock informed the members of the government of the state of animal health, after the outbreak of the fever epizootic Rift Valley in Burundi, as well as the actions in progress for the control of this disease. He said that a first batch of vaccines is already available and that the other vaccines will arrive soon. The Council of Ministers has asked that all cows be tested and that those in good health be separated from others already contaminated.
The national committee responsible for coordinating all actions to combat this disease has been set up and is made up of the Minister of the Interior, that of Agriculture and Livestock, that of Public Health, representatives of the presidency of the Republic, of the vice-presidency of the Republic and of the Prime Minister.
The members of the government also analyzed the Report of the Commission responsible for analyzing the orders of battle and the rational management of human resources.
After analyzing the report presented, the Cabinet meeting endorsed the Commission’s recommendations. This involves, among other things, updating or drawing up ordinances for the application of the decrees organizing the sectoral ministries by specifying the workforce by service, the service missions and others, defining the specifications before recruitment, redefining the specifications according to the legal framework and not according to the personnel in activity, improve the definition of the personnel specifications by combining certain missions defined in the legal framework and proceed with the reassignment of the plethoric personnel.
It also involves granting retirement to staff who have reached the statutory retirement age, with the exception of staff whose skills are not available, correcting the shortcomings observed in the match between training and employment by gradually recruiting staff according to the training profile required by the position to comply with the principle of the current salary policy which advocates the principle of remuneration for employment and not only for the diploma and to extend this work to parastatal institutions with management autonomy for avoid the plethora which would be one of the causes of the increase in the payroll or even the bankruptcy of these institutions.
It will also be necessary to allow for the reassignment of staff within each ministry, and the rest of other ministries. For overstaffed staff who will run out of space following their course, organize capacity building training to reassign them to the right place.