The Cabinet has today deferred a US$50 million World Bank request from the Ministry of Finance, to support refugee hosting areas and communities.
‘While cabinet members appreciated the problem refugee hosting communities face, they noted the need for; the loan to be comprehensive and cover all refugee hosting areas of the country and a policy on how government can sustainably support refugee hosting communities with or without a loan,’ a release states in part.
The loan will be brought back to cabinet after wider consultations have been carried out on the areas cabinet raised.
Also discussed at today’s Cabinet meeting was the plight of Ugandan exporters to South Sudan market that suffered non-payment on account of the instability there.
As a result, the ministers directed the ministries of finance and foreign Affairs to liaise with the government of South Sudan on modalities for the repatriation of proceeds of Ugandan companies held in commercial banks and also pursue government of South Sudan to expeditiously form a joint cooperation commission to arbitrate the pending claims of Ugandans against South Sudan individuals.
‘A cabinet subcommittee comprising of Attorney General, ministers of Trade and finance has been tasked to oversee the whole process of negotiations of the modalities with the government of South Sudan,’ the release adds.
Meanwhile, that Cabinet today resolved that any future borrowing should never finance components of administration and capacity as these are always catered for in ministries’ domestic budgets.
The ministers also directed that loan beneficiary entities and Ministry of Finance -the contracting entity, should never procure or sign off any loan before all the preparatory activities are in place to avoid delayed implementation that results into financial penalties on un-utilized loans.
‘This is in furtherance of the resolutions of the recently concluded Kyakwanzi retreat that termed this tenure of government ‘Kisanja Hakuna Mchezo’, they noted.
