The Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD) wishes to inform the Public that it is taking administrative measures against any Constituency, whose utilisation of the 2023 Constituency Development Fund (CDF) allocation, was low.
Permanent Secretary (Administration) Mr. Maambo Haamaundu has, however, clarified that contrary to speculations, the Ministry will not withdraw any CDF held in Banks from the 2023 financial year, but will ensure the Funds are utilised efficiently and effectively on planned-developmental activities.
Mr Haamaundu stressed that the administrative actions against low CDF utilisation, are aimed at ensuring that funds are channeled to all developmental activities planned by communities within a given time-frame.
He said the Ministry is undertaking measures to ascertain what led to some Constituencies recording low CDF burn-rate (money spent), when at the same time, others utilised the same Fund exceptionally well during the same financial year.
In 2023, the Ministry released the entire K4,715,218,531.00, which includes K298, 249, 817.44, supplementary budget, for the CDF to all the 156 Constituencies.
This translated to each Constituency across the country, receiving 100% CDF funding amounting to K28,313,902.01 allocated in the 2023 national budget.
“CDF is a fund exclusively designed to economically and socially empower Citizens across the country, allowing them to implement their own development agenda to improve their livelihoods, and should in turn, accelerate the countrys development trajectory,” the Permanent Secretary stated.
He reiterated that through CDF, the Governments aspirations of reducing poverty and inequalities are being attained through; empowerment of women, youths and vulnerable groups, skills development, provision of secondary bursaries, and implementation of various community projects.
CDF is one of the New Dawn Governments flagship programmes, whose amount was enhanced from a paltry K1.6 Million per Constituency in 2021 to an unprecedented K25.7 million in 2022, and K28.3 million in 2023 with a further increase in this years National Budget to K30.6 million per Constituency. The aim is to ensure more resources are directly provided to communities for local development and provision of basic services such as clean and safe drinking water, maternity wings, school desks and other necessary school infrastructure, among others.