Service providers to be paid directly

By Rebecca Kuku
Election service providers will be paid electronically through the Inter-Department Election Commission (IDEC) Trust Fund, says Finance Secretary Dr Ken Ngangan.
“Police, Defence, Ombudsman Commission, anything to do with the elections, all their funding will be kept under the IDEC trust fund which will be managed by the Finance Department and the electoral commission,” he said.
Ngangan said that from past experiences, there were a lot of complaints for non-payments of services provided.
The Finance Department has now come up with a new system that allows for direct payments into individual service providers’ account.
“In previous elections, we gave money to service providers and nobody knows what they did or how they used it,” he said.
“Now we are cutting back and will do things correctly because we now have resources that were not available in the past like electronic banking.”
Ngangan said that they already had a list of all service providers’ bank details and would pay them directly though their individual accounts.
“This new system will allow no room for credit or liability as the past elections did.
“Our priority is now the 2017 election and as soon as money is available, all outstanding from the 2012 elections will be paid.”
Ngangan said that the Government did not deny the fact that it had an outstanding accounts to settle for the 2012 elections but admitted that yes; they did have a liability to settle for the past election.
“We will settle the liability when the timing is right and when funds are available, that is why we have the new system in place so that the 2017 elections will have no outstanding liabilities.”
It is understood that the Government has K72 million outstanding for the 2012 elections.