Staff Reporter
Windhoek-National Unity Democratic Organisation (Nudo) member of parliament Meundju Jahanika has called on the government to speed up the establishment of the proposed revenue collection agency.
He said the agency, which was approved by Cabinet in September 2013, would help the Ministry of Finance in collecting more revenue.
“The establishment of the revenue collection agency should not be delayed,” Jahanika said while contributing to the debate on the national budget last week.
Jahanika also applauded the Minister of Finance Calle Schlettwein for having worked hard to balance the budget and reduce the burden of long-term debt.
He said a stronger budget should support permanent or long-term employment creation, economic growth and structural change, and requested the government to come up with a programme of radical economic transformation.
“It is also worth noting that our national budget is the official instrument through which we must, in principle, attempt to channel public funds in a responsible manner that aim to re-engineer our economy and spur it to greater heights,” he said.
According to him, it does not need a rocket scientist to diagnose the hard reality that young people have been pushed into joblessness as a result of government’s inability to be proactive on national issues.
“I must remind our people that most of our citizens are systematically handicapped by poverty.”
Jahanika also used the opportunity to request the government to introduce a budget committee as one of the parliamentary standing committees.
He said in the past he had requested the government to introduce a budget committee but nothing was done, adding that other members who are skilful on finances in the house had also made contributions which warrant to bring change to the budget as far as allocation is concerned, but their advice was also ignored.