Zanzibar adopts digital budgeting system to boost efficiency
Dar es Salaam. The government of Zanzibar has adopted and rolled out a digital budgeting system.
The system is expected to increase transparency and consistency and promote accountability among planners, implementers and decision-makers.
Known as the Planning, Budgeting and Reporting System (PlanRep), the initiative is a collaboration between the Zanzibar government and the US Agency for International Development (USAID).
The USAID’s Public Sector Systems Strengthening Plus (PS3+) project collaborates with government entities to promote increased citizen engagement in the transparent management and delivery of public services.
Supported by the US President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (Pepfar), the project seeks to strengthen government systems at both national and local levels to improve access, use and quality of service deliveries across agriculture, education, health and other sectors, with a major focus on support for underserved populations.
Budget officer from the President’s Office of Financing and Planning (POFP) in Zanzibar, Ms Khadija Alhaji Bakari, said that before the introduction of PlanRep, the Zanzibar government was using manual and non-responsive tools to prepare its plans and budgets.
She said the tools lack automatic linkage between the plans, budgets, and expenditure systems, hence there was a lack of autonomy in the organisation’s plans and budgets with unclear vision and linkages to national objectives.
“The old way of doing things resulted in numerous errors and inconsistent data. It required extensive cross-checking due to the absence of automatic linkages, and reduced efficiency, leading to substantial costs. Manual systems also left limited opportunities for authorities to detect funding misuse,” Ms Bakari said.
The system is now renamed Zanzibar Planning and Reporting System (ZanPBRS) after being customised.
“As roll the rollout of ZanPBRS began, it was integrated with the government’s expenditure management system (MUSE) and the interoperability between the two systems gave users a famous name called BAMAS (Zanzibar Digital Government Strategy system which in Kiswahili is known as Mfumo wa Bajeti na Matumizi Serikalini),” she said.
As a result, after plans are created and approved in ZanPBRS, they are transferred to MUSE to enable expenditure for accounting purposes and funded amounts appear in ZanPBRS for tracking and reporting purposes, she said.
Permanent secretary in Zanzibar Finance and Planning ministry, Dr Juma Malik Akil said with ZanPBRS, government institutions and local government authorities can now digitally submit plans and budgets for approval, reducing delays in executing public initiatives aimed at improving the quality of life for citizens, such as the construction of clean water access points or the procurement of essential medical supplies.
“Thanks to the system, once funds are allocated, government institutions and local authorities’ staff can track and report their spending in ZanPBRS for monitoring by officials. The increased transparency ensures that the budget the government allocates goes where it is supposed to and improves service delivery to the citizens in our communities,” he said.
Zanzibar e-Government Agency (eGAZ) managing director, Mr Said Seif Said, said the government has developed a five-year roadmap known as the “Digital Economy and Statistics Map” which seeks to effectively utilise digital tools, enhance efficiency, and bolster capacity building through human capital development.
