Touch Yuthea
The Mekong Times
A committee has been formed by NGOs and associations including the NGO Forum on Cambodia, the Economic Institute of Cambodia (EIC) and the Center for Social Development, to closely monitor government revenues and expenditures.
Cambodians for National Revenue Transparency (CNRT) has been formed amid expectations that cash-strapped Cambodia, which currently needs millions of US dollars of aid annually, will reap billions from oil, gas and other natural resources in the future.
“The NGOs have established the alliance to monitor Cambodia’s management of national incomes from oil, minerals and gas — to ensure the money is utilized effectively to serve the common interests of the Cambodian people,” Chhith Sam Ath, executive director of the NGO Forum on Cambodia, said on Wednesday.
EIC Director Dr. Sok Hach did not elaborate on the CNRT yesterday, but said he would wait until after the July 27 national election before giving in-depth comment.
The CNRT has joined with another existing NGO alliance, Commercial Network and Economic Development (CNED), which was created in 2007 by some 10 NGOs and associations.
The CNED aims at annually analyzing budget practices and revenue management to ascertain whether government revenues and expenditures are consistent with prioritized plans set by the National Assembly in the 2007 national budget and the 2008 budget law.
“Since its inception in 2007, the NGO alliance has noticed that our national budget, compared to 2007 and 2008, has increased. Overall, the budget packages – both the current and funding budget – have been on the rise,” said Chhith Sam Ath.
Government spokesman and Information Minister Khieu Kanharith welcomed the formation of the NGO alliances to monitor the distribution of national budgets, but questioned their ability.
“First, how many economists who are skilled and able to monitor national budget do the NGO alliances have?” he asked. “The establishment of the monitoring NGO alliances seems to be a slap in the face of the opposition. It implies opposition legislators are stupid and have no knowledge of how to monitor the national budget, which is why they have set up another [budget monitoring institution].”
The influx of huge oil and gas revenues into Cambodia’s economy has raised fears among NGOs that it could be struck by the ‘resource curse,’ which has seriously destabilized natural resource rich countries such as Nigeria.
Cambodians for National Revenue Transparency (CNRT) has been formed amid expectations that cash-strapped Cambodia, which currently needs millions of US dollars of aid annually, will reap billions from oil, gas and other natural resources in the future.
“The NGOs have established the alliance to monitor Cambodia’s management of national incomes from oil, minerals and gas — to ensure the money is utilized effectively to serve the common interests of the Cambodian people,” Chhith Sam Ath, executive director of the NGO Forum on Cambodia, said on Wednesday.
EIC Director Dr. Sok Hach did not elaborate on the CNRT yesterday, but said he would wait until after the July 27 national election before giving in-depth comment.
The CNRT has joined with another existing NGO alliance, Commercial Network and Economic Development (CNED), which was created in 2007 by some 10 NGOs and associations.
The CNED aims at annually analyzing budget practices and revenue management to ascertain whether government revenues and expenditures are consistent with prioritized plans set by the National Assembly in the 2007 national budget and the 2008 budget law.
“Since its inception in 2007, the NGO alliance has noticed that our national budget, compared to 2007 and 2008, has increased. Overall, the budget packages – both the current and funding budget – have been on the rise,” said Chhith Sam Ath.
Government spokesman and Information Minister Khieu Kanharith welcomed the formation of the NGO alliances to monitor the distribution of national budgets, but questioned their ability.
“First, how many economists who are skilled and able to monitor national budget do the NGO alliances have?” he asked. “The establishment of the monitoring NGO alliances seems to be a slap in the face of the opposition. It implies opposition legislators are stupid and have no knowledge of how to monitor the national budget, which is why they have set up another [budget monitoring institution].”
The influx of huge oil and gas revenues into Cambodia’s economy has raised fears among NGOs that it could be struck by the ‘resource curse,’ which has seriously destabilized natural resource rich countries such as Nigeria.
5 comments:
There, problem solved. Now all we have to do is to get the oil and sell it. Otherwise, there is nothing to monitor.
The creation of this CNRT and the government spokesman's acquiessence in it prove yet again that state institutions, the national audit office, the system of checks and balances and indeed the whole system of government are dysfucntional and devoid of all public confidence.
I may add that people's immediate resort to NGOs when their rights are violated, instead of going to complain to the police and courts of law, is another testimony to the failure of the state institutions and the lack of public confience in them.
All this is bad for the country as a whole when all state institutions are created to serve the people.
As a remedy to this state failure, I propose that the new parliament issued from this month's election would make sure it can oversee all activities of the new government it is going to appoint. It should hold the government accountable to it, which is the depository of the power of the people.
The same parliament should also endow our August King with a machanism and resources so that He can His constitutional duty of ensuring the proper functioning of the public authorities (art.9 of the Constitution). (In this matter, our August King has the same duty as the French President (see art.5 of the Fench Constitution))
To have an effective oversight of goverment activities, I propse that the new parliament would let the opposition party or parties chair its budget, interior, anti-corruption and human rights committees. The legislative assembly of the province (state) of Ontario, the biggest province in Canada (I had visited in 2003)has adopted in its standing orders a tradition of allocating the chairmanship of at least its budget committee to the opposition party. ( I may add that the speaker (chairman) of that assembly is an ordinary Member of Parliament, not the president of any party, and not many MPs want to be or can be speaker when the position is very demanding, especially when he or she has to be seen as impartial)
LAO Mong Hay, Hong Kong
i love this concept of establishing an independent watchdog as nobody should trust the gov't completely without this kind of check and balance by a non-profit ngo group composed of interested individuals. god bless.
this is proactive approach and thank you all for having this kind of organization until gov't can earn trust from the citizens and until gov't can show that they are strict with official corruption like in thailand, honk kong or singapore for that matter. god bless cambodia.
The establishment of Nation Budget monitoring organization is another entity to work with the opposition party over the concern of un-abating corruption ruling by the HUN SEN government. Cambodian people cannot stand by and wait for their future to be destined by the government or by the opposition party. Cambodians mus step in whenever we see the fit to do so.
thank you all and may god bless cambodia and everyone who loves and cares about all things cambodia. someone has to love and look after cambodia. we must get rid of tyranny as we see fit. no more tyranny!
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