Parliamentary Budget Office is needed now
Dithapelo Keorapetse | Friday January 15, 2016 16:36
Is Botswana Parliament active in budgetary matters? These are fundamental questions which when frankly answered can provide an idea of what obtains in Botswana in respect of the budget and oversight. The legislative authority of Botswana vests in Parliament which primary role is to enact, reform and repeal laws governing the nation. Budget is a law, Appropriation Act. Parliament supposedly wields what is commonly referred to as the power of the purse in the Westminster system. Botswana’s economy is run primarily by the bureaucratic economic high command at the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning. These bureaucratic elites, assisted somewhat by a few political elites in the Presidency, have, by and large, determined the country’s economic trajectory since independence in terms of formulation of National Development Plans and determination of annual budgets to finance the plans. Politicians have for many years had no influence in socio-economic development matters. The elites at the economic high command were insulated from political and other influence. The genesis of the phenomenon of a powerless Parliament on budgetary matters can be found in the situation described above. What exacerbated the problem was the level of understanding or appreciation of budget matters by early Parliaments. Contemporary Botswana Parliaments are however different.
When one uses profound yardsticks of democracy, Botswana Parliament is less independent and powerless, has low information needs and low internal structures and it approves almost everything decided by the executive or the ruling party caucus. In other words it is a rubber tamp legislature. This is because the ruling party has been in power for long and has numerical strength in the house, including the abnormality of a high percentage of the executive in the legislature and the majority of executive members, relative to the backbench, in the ruling party caucus. It is therefore imperative for Parliament to be independent of the executive, particularly the Office of the President. It is important that it becomes powerful, has high information needs and complex internal structures. In this way, it would be able to provide effective oversight including oversight of the budget. More critically, Parliament should have a budget office. This is generally a consensus of most African countries which are democratic if one considers for instance resolutions taken by Southern African Development Community Organisation of Public Accounts Committees (SADCOPAC). The organisation recognises the importance of the office for purposes of enhancing transparency, accountability and efficiency and effectiveness.
Parliamentary Budget Office should be established to provide an independent and objective analysis to Parliament on the state of the polity’s finances, budget estimates and trends in the country’s economy. It should assist Parliament with estimation and veracity of financial proposals. Parliament needs an independent, authoritative and impartial economic analysis to aid it and this can be provided by the budget office. MPs should be supported in exercising their constitutional roles of providing oversight of the budget. If the office is independent and provides objective information and services without fear, favour or prejudice and engender trust by providing reliable information, Parliamentary oversight can be achieved.
The office should be staffed by experts in economics, political economy, law and finance and other necessary fields. These shouldn’t be employees of the government reporting to a minister, otherwise it would be a futile exercise. The office ought to be a think tank of Parliament on fiscal and other incidental matters. It should be well-resourced in terms of staffing and the budget and well-remunerated to attract, retain and motivate its staff.
Currently, during deliberations on the budget, it has become common over many years that whatever is requested by the Minister will be granted as it is with MP playing a minimal role. What most MPs do is to just talk about desired developments at their constituencies. It doesn’t matter whether it is during general discussions or committee stage. Essentially, the whole exercise becomes somewhat a ritualistic talkshow in which MPs lament about deficiencies of developments in their electoral districts. Most MPs do so mindful of the fact that a Radio Botswana reporter will report on what the MP has said later in the evening on a radio program for Parliament. The idea is for the constituents to hear that you’ve been speaking for the area. As the MPs say this, Ministers are hardly listening and this, in almost all the time, hasn’t resulted in any change, fundamental or minor, in the budget proposed. Parliament has become Maokaneng!
During the 10th Parliament, there were some steps including some discussions at some committees and inter-parliamentary committees and the Office of the Speaker to establish the budget office. However, the issue hasn’t been brought up in the 11th Parliament. It may actually die given the posture of the current Speakership. The idea has to be resuscitated to enhance Parliament scrutiny of the budget.
Democratisation, in particular democratic consolidation in the case of Botswana, and constitutional reform, provide good opportunities for parliamentary fiscal power.
If the ruling party stands on the way of reforming Parliament through among other things, refusal of the introduction of the budget office, then this ideas should be part of the larger change that will come with regime change in 2019.
There can never be democracy without an independent Parliament that has proper powers and is well-resourced.