Tanzania falls sharply in Open Budget Survey, new study shows
What you need to know:
The OBS findings suggest that the country has scored 15 and 41 marks out of 100 in the areas of citizen’s participation and the budget oversight respectively.
Dar es Salaam. Tanzania has seen a sharp fall in the 2016/17 Open Budget Survey (OBS) in all identified indicators after scoring ten marks out of 100, against 46 scored in 2015/2016.
The OBS findings suggest that the country has scored 15 and 41 marks out of 100 in the areas of citizen’s participation and the budget oversight respectively.
At the regional level, Uganda has topped the East African Community (EAC) member states after scoring 62 marks followed by Kenya and Rwanda with 48 and 36 marks out of 100 respectively. The Survey was conducted for a period of 18 months starting August 2016.
Releasing the findings on Thursday, March 29, during the breakfast debate organised by Policy Forum, OBS country researcher Godfrey Boniventura said the findings indicated that Tanzania was moving backward at an alarming rate in the three measured areas.
"Tanzania provides scant budget information to citizens and the study found out that only three out of eight budget documents were publicly available," he said.
During the study, he said, availability of eight key budget documents, the amount and level of details contained in the reports and timeliness for provision of information were compared to best practice for fiscal transparency indicated by international organisations including the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the INTOSAI Lima declaration on Guidelines of SAI.
The OBS 2017 survey held interviews with Members of Parliament (MPs), government officials, paying visits at the National Audit Office of Tanzania and the websites of the Ministry of Finance and Planning as well as that of Parliament of Tanzania.
