Ethics outfit keen on promoting efficiency
The Ethics Secretariat launched yesterday the Ethics Management Information System (EMIS) in a quest to increase efficiency in collecting public leaders’ information. Lack of funds remains an obstacle in the property assessment of leaders.
Section 9 of the Public Leadership Code of Ethics requires every public leader to submit to the secretariat a written declaration of all property and assets owned and liabilities owed to him/ her, his/her spouse or unmarried minor children within 30 days of taking office and at the end of each year.
Commissioner for Ethics Secretariat, Judge (rtd) Harold Nsekela, said each year the number of public leaders increases which makes the commission to fail to work effectively. But the EMIS will assist them in collecting necessary information easily.
He said that property assessment was important because it enables the secretariat to identify diligent leaders and those who are crooks. Public leaders will be able to fill in forms as required by law electronically unlike in the previous years.
“Until now many officials have not been verified. As from December 2016, we planned to review 500 officials but to date only 116 have been verified. He added that more than 15,000 public leaders were overseen by the secretariat,” he told officials who attended the launch in Dar es Salaam yesterday.
According to Judge Nsekela, EMIS was designed by the University of Dar es Salaam Computing Centre (UCC) in partnership with e-Government agency, secretariat and others. Canada government provided the funds to implement it disbursing 3,340 US dollars.
The commissioner further urged leaders to provide genuine information about their properties and once required to appear before the secretariat to give more clarification, they should not hesitate to do so.
Minister of State in the President’s Office, Public Service Management and Good Governance, Angela Kairuki, said plans were underway to create a mobile application for leaders to be able to fill the form wherever they are without any excuses.
On lack of funds, she said the government would work with the secretariat in addressing the challenges facing it, including lack of financial resources and offices. She also assured them that before June the government will provide funds to finish the assessment of public leaders.