MUTARE-Transparency International Zimbabwe is set to file an urgent High Court application to compel government to publish the distribution matrix of the Covid-19 funds.
TIZ executive director Muchaneta Mundopa told delegates at a virtual Public Finance Management Reform Indaba hosted by the Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt on Development (ZIMCODD), that publication of donations received without accounting for their expenditure was insufficient.
As a result, the corruption watchdog, has filed an urgent application to force government’s hand to publish the distribution matrix said Mundopa.
She said that the Covid crisis has exposed the frailties of an underfunded public health system which could not be compounded by lack of civil society oversight on the use of public resources availed to fight the pandemic.
“Today we will be filing an urgent court application at the High Court, where we are trying to compel the government to publish the distribution matrix in as far as how they have handled the donations that have come form from the public, its own purse even from international player.
“As has been raised, is publication of they have received donations enough, our position as an organization is that no this is not so we will be filing a court application to this regard,” said Mundopa.
“When it comes to the COVID crisis, our focus as an organization is focusing on two aspects and transparency and accountability in the distribution and utilization of the resources.
“Good public financial management is also very key in the accessing universal health care, and this Covid has shown is that because of our misdirected priorities as a nation we have a health system that is crumbling.”
Mundopa also called for the Procurement Authority of Zimbabwe to decentralize and create a publicly accessible beneficial ownership register to ensure of transparency awarding for procurement contracts of service providers to government.
She said government should publish names of supplying companies and names of the owners as such information is ‘necessary for to the people follow on issues of conflict of interest and corruption.’
