Jakarta – The government is committed to imposing a "rewards-and-punishments" mechanism to promote accountability in regional budgets, since less than 3 percent of the budgets for 2009 were deemed "clean", a minister says.
Finance Minister Agus Martowardojo on Monday said only a handful of the budget spending by regional governments received unqualified opinions.
"This figure is still very small," Agus said after a hearing with the budget board of House of Representatives. The hearing was to discuss a draft law on the 2009 budget accounting.
In its 2009 budget, he said, the government had allocated Rp 309 trillion (US$34.3 billion) for regional governments.
Unfortunately, in its audits of accounts from 2009 of 503 administrations nationwide, the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) only gave 13 of them unqualified audit opinions (meaning the accounts were verified as OK).
"This shows us the poor quality of budget disbursement and accounting in most regions," Agus said.
He added that the government would develop rewards-and-punishments mechanisms to improve regional budget accounting. "We should have better accounting reports to reflect good governance" in line with a higher allocation of regional transfers next year, he said.
In the central government's proposed 2011 budget, regional transfers will reach Rp 378.4 trillion, a 9.8 percent increase from Rp 344.6 trillion in the revised 2010 budget. This amount comprises regional balancing funds and special autonomy funds. The balancing funds will increase to Rp 329.1 trillion next year from Rp 314.4 trillion in the revised 2010 budget, while the special autonomy budget for Papua, West Papua and Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam will increase to Rp 49.3 trillion in 2011 from Rp 30.2 trillion in the revised 2010 budget.
Agus said that the government would have better budget accounting, starting with a transparent and accountable audit system.
The implementation of reward and punishment would deliver more transparent and accountable budget accounting, he added.
"A good [accounting] system should be initiated with good planning and a good approval process. We should also have a good monitoring and reporting system while starting to disburse the budget," he said.
"We hope Indonesia can have transparent and accountable accounting systems, both in the central and regional governments, producing unqualified audit opinions.
"It's a kind of target we dream of," he said, adding that the government hoped it could impose a comprehensive and accountable rewards-and-punishments mechanisms in regional governments' accounting next year. (ebf)