Online Reporter
Sikhulekelani Moyo, Sunday News Reporter
PARLIAMENT has launched a drive to strengthen fiscal oversight, with Speaker of the National Assembly Advocate Jacob Mudenda calling on Members of Parliament (MPs) to take full ownership of the budget process and ensure public resources deliver measurable results for citizens.
Officiating at the Capacity Building Workshop on Budget Analysis for the Portfolio Committees on Defence; Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, Local Government and Public Works and Women’s Affairs, Community, Small and Medium Enterprises Development, on Saturday, Adv Mudenda said the role of Parliament in scrutinising public expenditure is not optional but a constitutional mandate that must be exercised with authority and technical rigor.
Adv Mudenda set the tone of the workshop around the need for Parliament to stop accepting the National Budget as a fait accompli.
“For too long, the narrative of the National Budget has been authored elsewhere and delivered to you as a fait accompli, consigning you to passive spectators in decisions that directly affect the welfare of the people you are sworn to represent and serve,” he said.
He told MPs that for too long the budget narrative had been authored elsewhere, leaving legislators as passive spectators in decisions that directly affect the welfare of the people they represent.
The workshop, he said, marks the beginning of the ennobling journey of becoming the lion that writes its own story through disciplined mastery of budget analysis.
Central to that journey, he emphasised, is moving beyond perfunctory examination to a penetrating, forensic analysis of the National Budget across every dimension.
The Speaker stressed that effective oversight demands technical mastery of public resource management.
“No Committee can discharge its fiscal oversight with authority if it is not familiar with the architecture of the budgetary system it is mandated to interrogate,” he said.
He described the Public Finance Management (PFM) framework as the rulebook that ensures taxpayers’ money reaches the intended beneficiaries, and urged Committees to interrogate it relentlessly.
He noted that the PFM system rests on legal and institutional foundations that cover the entire budget cycle from planning and approval to implementation, expenditure, and monitoring and evaluation with accountability and fiscal oversight placed at the centre.
Citing provisions of the Public Finance Management Act [Chapter 22:19], he said monthly, quarterly and annual reporting obligations create a continuous accountability chain that enables Committees to monitor fiscal performance in real time rather than retrospectively.
“Every accounting officer shall submit quarterly financial statements and reports for submission by the Minister to the appropriate Parliamentary Portfolio Committee, within sixty days of the end of the respective quarter,” said Adv Mudenda.
“Every accounting officer shall submit monthly financial statements and reports for submission by the Minister to the appropriate Parliamentary Portfolio Committee, within thirty days of the respective month.”
The same discipline, he added, extends to public entities and State enterprises, with officials enjoined to take effective and appropriate steps to prevent any irregular expenditure and fruitless and wasteful expenditure and any under-collection of revenue due.
The Speaker framed budget oversight as a categorical constitutional duty, anchored in sections of the Constitution that make all state institutions accountable to Parliament and enshrine principles of prudence, equity and democratic accountability.
He also linked Zimbabwe’s approach to a broader regional consensus, noting that effective legislative oversight is now considered central to sound public financial management across the region.
The expectation, he said, is for Parliament to use the full range of mechanisms available, committee hearings, questions, debates and ministerial statements, to oversee the public financial management process.
The Speaker urged MPs to apply four key tests to every allocation: adequacy, priority, equity and effectiveness.
In practice, he said, this means asking whether resources match the scale of development challenges, whether priorities receive the fiscal weight they deserve, whether vulnerable groups are not left behind, and whether spending can be verified to have transformed lives.
He called for Committees to pursue both allocative efficiencies, directing resources to production and productivity, and operational efficiency, deploying resources with economy and minimal waste.
A particular emphasis was placed on pro-poor budgeting.
Adv Mudenda said every allocation should be subjected to one test: whether it directly improves the livelihoods of the poorest households.
To do this, he encouraged the use of modern tools such as data analytics, public expenditure tracking systems and performance dashboards.
He also noted that sector-specific international benchmarks can guide Committees in assessing whether budgets in areas like justice, social welfare, local government, defence and women’s affairs are adequate and properly oriented.
The workshop was presented as a deliberate step toward institutionalised excellence in parliamentary oversight, drawing lessons from other legislatures that have invested in analytical capacity.
Adv Mudenda’s overall sentiment conveyed was one of urgency and empowerment: with less than five years to 2030, he said Parliament must assert its constitutional role, close the gap between budget commitments and service delivery outcomes, and ensure that public funds advance equity, efficiency and development impact for all Zimbabweans.
