Finance Minister Matia Kasaija on December 23 tabled before Parliament a Shs49.9 trillion proposed budget for financial year 2023/24 hence a likely increment of Shs1.8 trillion from the national budget under implementation.
Deputy Speaker, Thomas Tayebwa referred the Budget Framework Paper (BFP) to the House Committee on Budget and the relevant Sectoral Committees, and a report is expected by the end of January in order to meet the legal requirements.
The Public Finance Management Act (PFMA), 2015 provides that the BFP should be laid before Parliament by the end of the calendar year and should be passed by February 1 of the New Year.
“The Budget Framework Paper is hereby referred to the Committee on Budget. We have only one month to process it. We have up to January 30 to receive a report and pass the BFP by February 1” Tayebwa said.
Kasaija told Parliament that the BFP had passed the compliance test because it was accompanied by a certificate of gender compliance issued by the Equal Opportunities Commission.
In the resource envelope, the Ministry of Finance projects raise Shs28.8 trillion from local revenue; Shs2.49 trillion from Budget support; Shs1.5b from domestic borrowing; Shs8 trillion from projects support/external borrowing; Shs8.7 trillion from domestic refinancing; and Shs238.5b from local government collected revenue.
Comparing the current budget and the projections for the next financial year; the government will borrow less domestically by Shs3.4 trillion down from Shs5 trillion in the 2021/22 budget whereas external financing will increase by Shs1.3 trillion in the coming year. Budget support is also projected to go down by Sh117.6 Billion from the current budget’s figure of Shs2.6 trillion.
Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) is expected to collect more taxes to meet the rise in the projected domestic revenue of Shs28.8 trillion up from Shs25.5 trillion that is supposed to be raised by June 30, 2023.
Whereas the projected revenue collected by the local governments is not set to change from the current Shs238.5 trillion, some increment of Shs790.9 Billion on domestic refinancing has been made.
The Budget Committee chaired by Kacumbala County legislator Patrick Isiagi Opolot is expected to interact with Finance Minister Kasaija and his technocrats to unveil the details of the proposed allocations of the money in the BFP.
According to the BFP, Shs30.2 trillion is expected to be spent by the government on the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) which focuses on expenditure for programmes like Governance and Security, Public Administration, Judiciary, Legislature, Agro-industry and Human Capital development, among others. Meanwhile, Shs2.4 trillion is planned for external debt repayments; Shs8 trillion to be spent on external financing; Shs8.7 trillion to pay domestic debts and Shs200b to settle domestic arrears.
In the BFP, the Ministry of Finance also discusses the issue of debt sustainability- a question that has been on the mind of many Ugandans especially the civil society organizations. This document indicates that the stock of public debt increased from $19.54 Billion in June 2021 to $20.99 Billion in June 2022 hence taking a 46.9 percent share of GDP.
