Welcoming the fact that the Court of Auditors found nothing wrong with the use of more than 99% of the funds intended for the fight against the pandemic and its effects, the Government stressed that it is up to the Court to take steps to take legal action against offending officials.For the government, the controversy would not have to be with regard to the report of the Court of Auditors on the management of the funds mobilised in the fight against Covid-19.The Minister of Finance and Budget, Moustapha Ba, and the Minister of Trade, Abdou Karim Fofana, who faced the press, wanted to bring the debate back to fair proportions.Dissecting the report of the Court of Auditors, the Minister of Finance, MamadouMoustapha Ba, strongly underlined that the Court made in its document, « 85 very relevant recommendations, which will be capitalised and internalised under good practices in terms of governance of public resources, in emergency and crisis situations”.Alongside these recommendations, some relate to management faults that have been identified and require that the perpetrators be the subject of judicial investigations.And on this point, the government leaves the initiative to the Court of Auditors.Moustapha Ba emphasised that for the thirty years that he has been in State Administration, he has seen several times civil servants brought before the Chamber of Financial Discipline for facts considered as mismanagement.As far as crimes and misdemeanours are concerned, the First President of the Court of Auditors will seize the Ministry of Justice.So, in fact, nothing to whip a spade.Nor, above all, enough to dismiss a minister or take him to court, as some would like.Especially since, on reading the report, the Government noted that out of the 1000 billion Force Covid-19 funds, only 6 billion 686 million 784 thousand 410 CFA francs was the subject of reservations from the magistrates of the Court of Auditors.So, in relative value, 0.4% of the total amount.And those responsible for this misuse, on reading the Court’s document, are senior officials from 9 ministerial departments.These include, among others, directors – heads of service and Admnistrative and Equipments Directors (Dage) in office at the time, in the Ministries of Health, Microfinance and Solidarity Economy, Mines and Geology, Development Community and Social Equity, Youth, Commerce, Women and the Family, as well as Culture and Communication.The charges against them are of various kinds and range, among other things, from « lack of justification of expenses » or absence of supporting documents » relating to expenses, to « payments without service rendered », including « over-invoicing » for the acquisition of certain products.Without forgetting certain cash payments for purchases, which is contrary to the rule in the Public Administration.If the ministers indicated that the accused persons, if they were brought to justice, will have all the time to explain themselves, they nevertheless wanted to point out certain inconsistencies on the part of the Court.Thus, Abdou Karim Fofana, whose services were cited as having indicated to the Ministry of Community Development, Social and Territorial Equity, the reference prices for the purchase of rice, which would have been fixed by Order 007111 of 22 May 2013, made a point of noting that from 2013 to 2020, there was no updated decree to take into account the evolution of rice prices on the market, « because the prices did not experience any spectacular increase, and that the government had abandoned the policy of approving the price of rice over this period ».For him, the magistrates of the Court could have taken these elements into account in their decisions.In any case, the incriminated Dage will certainly be able to bring in their defence, elements before the Financial Disciplinary Chamber if they were called upon.To put things in context, the Minister of Finance and Budget recalled that the 1000 billionof the Covid-19 Fund in question, was composed of 628 billionCfa drawn from the public Treasury, while 372 billion these were tax waiver measures aimed at enabling national private companies to be able to bear the shock of the loss of their economic activities and not to go out of business during the Covid-19 period.The Force Covid-19 fund was to enable the implementation of the Economic and Social Resilience Program (Pres) in its 4 axes, namely support for the health sector, strengthening the resilience of the population and social cohesion, safeguarding macroeconomic and financial stability, as well as securing the supply and distribution of foodstuff, medicines and energy.Moustapha Ba recalled that Senegal was congratulated by all its partners and ranked second in its good management of the Covid-19 pandemic, just behind New Zealand.But time passes by quickly…
By Mohamed GUEYE /mgueye@lequotidien.sn

  • Translation by Ndey T. SOSSEH