By Olimatou Coker
Lamin Dibba, the Executive Director of Center for Budget and Macroeconomic Transparency (CBMT) has blamed the National Assembly for failing in its budget oversight and acting against the financial abuse of the executive.
In an interview with The Standard, Dibba argued that the National Assembly should avoid being micro-managed by the Ministry of Finance. “They should be advocates for the citizens, not the ministries. They keep defending and justifying that ministries are not having their salary budget, furniture budget or that ministries budget lines are low. This is not why we put them there. They are there to speak on behalf of the citizens but they are not doing that.”
Dibba said lawmakers should be proper advocates for national development and they should do this by ensuring proper budget scrutiny, oversight and accountability. “That is what they owe the Gambians. And I implore them to do their oversight job,” he said.
He lamented that the oversight function of the National Assembly is “very weak” adding that lawmakers should not only approve the budget and fold their hands but they must ensure that it is executed as approved and that all the funds approved are actualised. According to him, lawmakers must also pay attention to the budget planning phase.
“Oversight function is key but the NAMs are lagging in this. They need to prioritise the people of The Gambia, not ministries. They must represent the people and the best way to do that is to represent them through development but because they do not take the time to scrutinise the actual component of the development budget, they make decisions that are wrong for the country. Few lawmakers are doing the work but the majority are not,” Dibba observed.
He called on the executive to have integrity and honesty in dealing with public finances. “Let them not just consider themselves as owners of public money. They are paid to do a job for the Gambian people,” Dibba charged.
