January 5, 2024
By Staff Reporter
ADDIS ABABA – (BORKENA) – The Interim Administration of the Tigray Region has announced that it has not received a response to its request for a five billion birr loan for the payment of salaries of government employees who have not been paid for two years.
The Chief of the Regional Finance Bureau, who remained anonymous, told the Amharic Weekly, the Reporter that the Interim Administration submitted the loan request to the Ministry of Finance three months ago and has not yet received a response.
The Reporter’s repeated attempts to contact the Treasury Director of the Ministry of Finance, Neteru Yewondwossen for comments were unsuccessful.
Chief of the Regional Finance Bureau, who wished to remain anonymous, said that as the two-year war in north Ethiopia has caused severe economic problems for the 137,000 civil servants in the Region, the annual budget approved by the federal government for the region was insufficient.
He said that as per the Public Finance proclamation, neither the Ministry of Finance nor the Federal Government can provide direct support, but this same proclamation allows the provision of loans by the Federal government to Regions.
It is to be recalled that the Finance Minister, Ahmed Shide, said months back that the Federal Government “cannot provide loans but direct support” for the regional governments that faced budget shortages, the Reporter said.
The Finance Bureau of the Interim Administration of Tigray Region forwarded the loan request with a belief of paying back within two years, in 2026, according to the Reporter.
The total budget of the Federal Government of 2023/24 of the Ethiopian Fiscal Year is 801.65 billion birr, out of which 214 billion birr was reserved for regional budget support.
The Finance Minister, Ahmed Shide said the other day that the allocation of budgetary support for the regions, which includes the administrations of Addis Ababa and Dire Dawa Cities, was prepared by “taking into consideration the amount of resources, mandatory expenses and budget pressures of the federal government”
According to this, although a 12.5 billion birr budget has been approved for Tigray Region, the amount was not enough to cover the salaries of the civil servants who have not been paid for a long time, the regional Finance Bureau noted.
“Although the loan request was made three months ago, it is currently under discussion by the top management body of the Ministry of Finance,” said the unnamed leadership member of the Ministry.