1200 accounts created as part of Money Act

By MARK HAHUIE
MORE than 1200 accounts have been created by Bank South Pacific (BSP) as part of the process of complying with the Public Money Management Regularisation Act.
BSP chief executive Robin Fleming said the process would require other banks holding the funds of State agencies to transfer them into these accounts.
“The approach taken by Finance (department) has been for agencies to maintain their current banking arrangements albeit with new and revised signing authorities,” Fleming said.
“As BSP has the largest bank branch network, in most cases banking is with BSP and we feel as a PNG-owned Bank that banking should be with BSP,” he said.
He said more than 1200 accounts had been created in the initial phase of the “operationalisation of the provisions of the Act”.
“BSP’s main concern, and that of others parties in this process, is to minimise the impact on overall system of liquidity, which, if not managed in a co-ordinated manner, could affect the Government’s domestic debt programme or slow down lending growth,” he said.
Treasury Secretary Dairi Vele explained last week that the Government was making sure that public funds were grouped in an organised manner instead of being “unused” in multiple accounts.
“The Public Finances Management Act states that public money or the people’s money should be spent in accordance with the national budget,” Vele said.
“But what is happening is some of these (State) organisations are making decisions about this extra cash without the Government knowing or having a say.
“And this is us correcting that. They should have funds which is enough to run their organisations. We are not taking any more than that.
“This is to bring all of non-tax revenue under the umbrella of the national budget so that the people know that this money is collected on their behalf and will be spent in accordance with the laws of this country, based on the decision of the leaders that they elected.”