May 17, 2018
Former President Ernest Bai Koroma has in his handing over note commended his successor for instituting Executive Order Number 1 on revenue mobilisation and expenditure control.
In his Executive Order Number 1, President Retired Brigadier Julius Maada Bio ordered the Accountant General to implement a Treasury Single Account which requires all ministries, departments and agencies to be depositing their revenues into one purse – the Consolidated Revenue Fund.
In his handing over note, Koroma commended the Executive Order, which according to him ‘sought to follow my implicit directives after I assented to the Fiscal Management and Control Act. Your Excellency is able to make that Order legally because I had just assented to the Fiscal Management and Control Act.’
He added: Your Excellency may now wish to further enhance the legal atmosphere within which your Orders are carried out by ensuring the strengthening of the relevant legal frameworks. It is a matter of urgency for your government to work with Parliament to ensure the enactment of the Financial Management and Control Bill into law.’
He noted that one of his key reforms was the initiation of the Treasury Single Account (TSA) to unify and link accounts through which the government receives all revenues and transacts all payments, and that a comprehensive inventory of government’s bank accounts at commercial banks therefore gave a consolidated view of government cash resources.
He said the TSA became operational in August 2017 with a pilot implementation on ten subvented agencies and ministries.
He stated, however, that his administration soon realised that they had legal issues with the implementation of the TSA and that there was urgent need to enact another law to enhance it.
‘To that end, my Government ensured that one of the final Acts passed through Parliament in 2017 was the Fiscal Management and Control Act which I assented to shortly before my tenure ended this year. This action of my Government now fully compelled MDAs to immediately deposit all collected revenues into the Consolidated Revenue Fund; all in furtherance of the implementation of the TSA,’ he said.