|
Govt stakes 7.5bn/- for CDF projects
2007-08-18 09:48:41
By Paschal Shao
The government has set aside 7.5bn/- as Constituency Development Fund (CDF) for various projects in the financial year 2007/08.
Prime Minister Edward Lowassa said this in Dodoma yesterday while closing the Eight Parliamentary Session.
Lowassa said plans to establish and manage the CDF were underway adding that the government was winding up the preparation of the CDF bill.
`The supervision procedures for the fund will be clearly explained when we table the bill in Parliament.` he said.
He further said that the fund would endeavour to increase the pace of development in the constituency by contributing to different programmes and resources.
According to Lowassa, all constituencies in the country would benefit from the fund.
The Prime Minister`s Office, regional administration and local government would supervise the fund while Vice President`s Office would manage funds for the Isles.
He said that the criteria used for distribution of the said funds would be the size of the constituency, number of people and the degree of poverty.
Lowassa added that, together with CDF, the government had also set aside 286bn/- in this financial year in a move to empower the wananchi in all the district councils.
`This is an average of 20bn/- for every region` he said and urged legislators to not only supervise and make follow ups of development funds in the councils, but also ensure that the funds were used accordingly to fight poverty.
Lowassa also said that the country had gone further steps in meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in education adding that primary school enrolment went up from 96 per cent in 2006 to 97.3 per cent this year.
He said that infant mortality rate had gone down from 161 in 1990 to 112 in 2005 and maternal deaths went down to 61 per cent from the time between 2000 and 2004.
Lowassa said that Tanzania had been among the first to benefit from debt cancellation from the World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Africa Development Bank (AfDB) through the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative (MDRI).
The Parliamentary Session started on June 12, this year here whereby a total of 437 questions were answered and three bills were tabled and passed.
Lowassa postponed the session to October 30, this year.
|
