By Mark N. Mengonfia –mmenginfia@gmail.com
Representative Francis S. Dopoh, II walked out of Thursday’s session of the House of Representative on grounds that his communication to invite Liberian Finance Minister Samuel Tweah was not discussed in Plenary, but it was sent to Committee Room, claiming he has violated the country’s Budget Law.
The River Gee County District #3 lawmaker wrote his colleagues requesting that the Minister of Finance and Development Planning (MFDP) and Liberia Revenue Authority (LRA) be made to appear before Plenary to discuss the performance of the Budget for the last two quarters.
Rep. Dopoh, II in his communication to that body said that the Budget Law of 2018/2019 provides for each ministry and agency to submit a quarterly spending report at most 15 days as at the end of each quarter.
He went on to say that since the passage of the 2018/2019 budget, they as the people direct representatives are yet to receive reports from the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning.
“There are some ministries and agencies who have provided their reports, but I call those reports dirt because we as lawmaker should be using the report from the Ministry Finance to see if those spending institutions reports are correct or not.”
In addition, he said that the importance of those fiscal outturns reports are intended to give them, (Lawmakers) an understanding of the performance of various budget lines and to help shape and guide the direction of the Government fiscal stance.
“It beats my imagination that in a country where the Budget is a cash-based balance budget, the Liberia Revenue Authority is over performing in revenue generations, while expenditure lines are underperforming as being reported,” the Liberian Lawmaker said.
The River Gee County Representative said that the failure of the Ministry of Finance to submit its reports for the past two quarters amounts to violation of the 2018/2019 Budget laws of Liberia.
Session 7 of the Budget law say that “each spending entity for which appropriations have been made in this budget shall submit a Quarterly Budget performance report to the National Legislature with explanatory notes of the quantitative and qualitative results for spending they appropriations herein provided. The reports are due within fifteen (15) days after the end of each Quarter,” according to the lawmaker has not been adhere to by the MFDP.
Displaying a copy of the Pro-Poor Agenda, Rep Dopoh, II said the way and form the government is proceeding is not in the right direction and if they (government) want to achieve in their Pro-Poor Agenda, it means that everyone needs to be given the chance to perform in their area of assignment / work.
Representative Dopoh’s protest did not in any way stop the plenary of the House of Representative to send his communication to its committee on Ways, Means and Finance.
The House Committee on Ways, Means and Finance has no time limit to report to plenary after its investigation.