By Jackson Onyango
The budget committee of Parliament has finally tabled the revised Shs52.7 trillion budget for the financial year 2023/24.
The revised budget proposed by the government is an increase from the earlier presented Shs50.9 trillion and higher than the current financial year budget worth Shs48 trillion.
MPs were told by the junior minister for general duties in the finance ministry, Mr Henry Musasizi, that the top most priority in the budget is the peace, security, and governance program followed by the maintenance of roads.
Though the budget has increased by Shs4.6 trillion the available discretionary resource for distribution to entities has slightly reduced to Shs25.4 trillion up from Shs25.16 trillion in the current budget.
The situation is exacerbated by interest payment which is bound to increase to Shs6 trillion up from Shs4.6 trillion in the current financial year, reimbursement of Shs1.5 trillion government owes Bank of Uganda while Shs217 billion is allocated for the recapitalization of the central bank.
Mr Michael Atingi-Ego, the Deputy Governor of Bank of Uganda confirmed while he appeared before the budget committee that the bank is owed Shs3 trillion by the central government.
The debt was occasioned by the inability of the government to pay back the redeemed securities in treasury bills and bonds incapacitated by the outbreak of Covid-19 in financial years 2020/21 and 2021/22.
To finance the budget, the government plans to generate Shs29 trillion from the domestic revenue collection, receive Shs2.7 trillion for budget support in the form of grants and loans, from domestic borrowing Shs3.3 trillion, domestic debt refinancing or rollover amounting to Shs8.3 trillion, another Shs8.2 trillion from external financing and Shs287 billion of revenue collected from the local governments.
With the budget partly financed with loans, the budget committee cautioned in its report on the need to cut down the appetite for borrowing.
This as the percentage share of the costly non-concessional loans increased to 25% by December 2022 up from 21.9 percent as of June 2022.
Uganda’s total debt is highlighted in the committee report to have bulged by 2.5 percent which was a jump from 78.7 trillion up to 80.7 trillion.
