Finland has said it is yet to decide whether to support Tanzania`s government budget in financial year 2008/2009 or freeze the aid following the reported misappropriation of funds in the Bank of Tanzania`s External Payment Account (EPA).
Satu Santala, Charge d’Affaires in the Finnish Embassy in Dar es Salaam, told this paper yesterday that her country’s hesitation over the support was caused by the non-completion of the EPA audit report.
Finland had lined itself up to support the central bank`s account with euro 2 million as part of its development aid to Tanzania.
However, the Finnish media earlier this week reported that there were now plans to freeze the assistance.
The Finnish daily regional newspaper Helsingin Sanomat recently quoted Keijo Ruokoranta, Desk Officer for Tanzania in the Finnish Foreign Ministry, as saying his government was planning to freeze part of the direct budget funding it had planned to give to Tanzania. He gave the rampant suspicions of corruption as the major reason for the move.
In her remarks yesterday, Santala said Finland had set aside euro 2 million in additional budget support for Tanzania - to go directly into EPA - but the payment was not made to Tanzania because the EPA audit had not been completed then.
She stated categorically that her government decided to stop providing aid to Tanzania after it established that the EPA audit was not completed in good time.
She added: ``But we are in a position discuss the matter because the report was completed in January this year at the Bank of Tanzania.
We are still negotiating with Tanzania and other development partners on ways we can support Tanzania in the coming fiscal year.``
The embassy official admitted that her government had not communicated with Tanzania on any definitive decision “because we have been discussing how future support can be made available``.
She hinted that her country would give a clear stand on the issue ``within the next few weeks``.
Elaborating on aid freeze, Santala said what was reported in Finnish and other western media ``represented a misunderstanding of the facts``.
``What in fact has happened hinges on problems with internet translation and slight misinterpretation from the Finnish language - which the western media appear to have misunderstood. There is really nothing especially dramatic,`` she noted.
Finance and Planning Deputy Minister Jeremiah Sumari said when contacted yesterday that the government had not received any official reports from the Finnish government on the reported freezing of part of its aid to Tanzania.
``There is an official government system of communicating that we need to use in receiving such kind of information. We have not received any report on the issue yet,`` he added.
Sumari explained that it would be improper for the government to work on newspaper reports before receiving official word from the Finnish government.
``You have opened our ears. We did not know that there is such a thing as freezing some of the aid. But we cannot work on newspaper reports; we must wait for official communication,`` he said.
This fiscal year alone, Finland has donated some euro 31 million to Tanzania, half of it directly into the government budget.
A recent audit of the central bank’s accounts revealed two cases of grand corruption, including the dubious payment of over 133bn/- to 22 Tanzanian companies - some widely believed to be ``briefcase`` ones.
President Jakaya Kikwete has since formed a task force to study the issue, including the full details on the firms, with Finance and Planning minister Mustafa Mkullo telling reporters recently that a total of 50bn/- has been recovered.
However, the government has neither named the companies and people believed to have returned the money nor given a breakdown of the amounts surrendered.
The task force has, meanwhile, appealed for understanding, patience and restraint from a public eager to get the full picture of the saga as soon as practicable.
It is just through the first two of the six months it has been given to complete its investigations and says it has a delicate assignment they need to handle with extreme care if justice is to be done to all concerned.
* SOURCE: Guardian, 13 Mar 2008
By Patrick Kisembo
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