Congo/Local authorities: the government intends to pay grants on a regular basis
The ordeal of departmental and municipal councils throughout the country and the delay in implementing decentralisation were the subject of the government's questioning by the Senate on 3 December during the oral question and debate session.
Several departmental and municipal councillors have been in a bad situation for months because of the non-payment of subsidies and retrocessions by the State. The salary arrears are estimated at about fifty months for some of them. Responding to the concerns of the senators, Prime Minister Anatole Collinet Makosso said that the government has preferred to deal with this issue step by step. "Now that we have a perfect control of the situation in Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire, we are going to start integrating the other local communities so that these subsidies are given to them.Now we have a perfect control of the situation in Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire, we are going to start integrating the other local communities so that these subsidies are now a little regular and this is the commitment we are making for 2022, " the head of government announced.
According to him, despite the multifaceted crisis that the country is going through, the government has mobilized, since last September, about one billion 402 CFA francs for the municipalities and 177 million CFA francs for the departments. An effort that it intends to continue next year. " In addition to this amount, for a while, we have been trying to mobilize almost 963 million CFA francs for Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire; 630 million CFA francs for Brazzaville and 335 million CFA francs for Pointe-Noire every month to try to make these two big cities work", the Prime Minister continued.
Projects of convention of establishments in the course of elaboration
Concerning the delay in the implementation of decentralization, the Head of Government indicated that this is due to cash flow difficulties, especially since the legal mechanism is in place. He said that the transfers of competences have been recorded and the texts implemented. He recalled that the decentralization process launched in 2003 worked well until 2014. Currently, the government is working, he said, on the transfer of competencies starting with basic education, where it has defined the mechanisms and conditions of distribution among the various local authorities.
Indeed, the executive has allocated about 14 billion CFA francs to compensate for the costs of the transfer of powers, including 6.91 595 billion CFA francs for education and 7, 988 885 for basic health. The credits are distributed by local authority and by institution since April 2021. The government is in the process of drawing up the draft agreements for the establishments.
The elected members of the upper house of Parliament have also deplored the fact that the reform introduced by the creation of the Single Payment Window (GUP)no longer allows for the retrocession of taxes intended for local communities, even though they represent ¾ of their tax revenues. According to Anatole Collinet Makosso, the creation of the GUP is a fundamental reform aimed at securing revenues. He explained that it is part of the fight against tax evasion and the retention of State and local government revenues by the services that provide and collect them.
Showing realism
He acknowledged that the implementation of this reform has experienced some difficulties in the assimilation of procedures, in the mastery of the computer tool by a number of executives. "These difficulties have been resolved. At the end of the meeting with the presidents of the departmental and municipal councils, in the presence of executives of the Ministry of Finance, instructions were given for the retrocession of local taxes, in this case additional cents, is done. We even decided that we could put the treasury agent at the level of the GUP... We found this formula, which will facilitate the task.We have found this formula, which will facilitate the task and you can be reassured that soon our local communities will benefit from what is due to them," the Head of Government concluded.
The President of the Senate, Pierre Ngolo, for his part, hoped that the government can be realistic and take into account the difficulties faced by local communities which are, according to him, in a situation of paralysis embarrassing.
Source: www.adiac-congo.com
