(MPGIS Press, 15 Sept 2023) The Provincial Fiscal Grant Coordinating Committee (PFGCC) of the Provincial Governance Strengthening Programme (PGSP) has concluded a three-day meeting to discuss the results of the Annual Performance Assessment of the Provincial Capacity Development Fund (PCDF) in the Nine Provinces for the year 2021/22. The meeting commenced on Wednesday 13th September, and ended on Friday 15th Sept2, 2023 at Tulagi, Central Province.
The Leader of the PCDF Projects Assessment Team, Tony Hou, presented their findings on the performance of the respective Provinces in implementing PCDF projects to the PFGCC members who deliberated on the reports, heard responses from the Provincial Secretaries to the issues raised in the PCDF Projects Implementation Assessment Report, and made recommendations to the PGSP Steering Committee known as the Joint Oversight Committee (JOC) who would be convening on 21st and 22nd Sept, 2023 to deliberate on the PFGCC recommendations.
The Assessment team for 2021/22 are Tony Hou, the Development Consultant, Roger Townsend, Accountant and Audit Consultant, and Rose Isukana, an Accountant and Audit Consultant. The team visited the provinces and assessed them by looking at evidence that would convince them that an individual Province has satisfactorily met the Minimum Conditions (MCs) and Performance Measures (PMs). Based on the evidence, the Assessors compiled their report and presented it to the PFGCC.
The PFGCC is the technical fiscal committee created by the PGSP’s JOC in 2009 to meet occasionally to review results of PCDF Assessment Reports and make recommendations to the JOC for final decision. It does not have the mandate to decide who to qualify as the final decision rests with the JOC. However, as per the PCDF Operations Manual, Provinces that failed the MCs have the opportunity to appeal against the result thus giving opportunity to Provinces to appeal against the results within two weeks. The appeal shall be heard by the Project Steering Committee called the Joint Oversight Committee (JOC), which shall meet on the 21st and 22nd of this month to go through the reports.
Members of the PFGCC are comprised of Deputy Secretaries from the following Ministries and Institutions, MECDM, MEHRD, MHMS, MWYCFA, MJLA, MPS, MRD, MNPDC, MoFT, All 9 Provincial Secretaries, the Deputy Secretary to Cabinet from the Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Deputy Accountant General at the Accountant’s General Office, and Deputy Auditor General from the Office of the Auditor General.
Permanent Secretaries of the above-named Ministries are members of the JOC including the Auditor General, the Accountant General, and Secretary to Cabinet. The PFGCC is chaired by the Deputy Secretary to the MPGIS and co-chaired by the Deputy Secretary to MoFT whilst the JOC is chaired by the Permanent Secretaries of the same Ministries in the same chairing and co-chairing order.
In their deliberation, members of the PFGCC thanked the Assessment team for the report citing its thoroughness and accurate reflection on what was on the ground at the time of the assessment with only one Province lamenting the way some of their issues were interpreted and handled in the assessment. The manner in which the Minimum Conditions (MCs) were treated by the Provinces dominated the discussions.
The MCs are crucial mechanisms for the Provinces and are derived from various legal instruments such as the Provincial Government Act 1997, the Public Finance Management Act of 2013 and the Financial Management Ordinances and Financial Instructions passed by the Provinces in 2018. The MCs are not perpetual as they are reviewed from time to time. The latest review of the MCs was in 2022 (last year) when new MCs were introduced and agreed by Provinces and the 12 line ministries. When a new MC is introduced it is socialised and subsequently adopted progressively making the PCDF modality a robust performance-based grant. Grace period of one to two years is given to provinces to prepare before they are assessed.
Only Nine (9) MCs were assessed in this round of assessment 2021/22 FY compared to the eleven (11) MCs that were assessed last year, 2020/21 FY. The two MCs that were dropped but crucial in its maintenance by the PGs were the MC on the Accurate and Updated Bank Reconciliations, and Compliance to Core Funding Contribution to the PCDF. These two MCs are amalgamated into the MC on reporting.
Below are the Nine (9) MCs that the Provinces were assessed on in this round of assessment 2021/22.
No. | Minimum Qualifying Conditions for a Province to Access PCDF Funding |
1. | Core Staff in Place: (Core posts are filled (PS, DPS, PTr, DPTr, PPC or Planning Officer (Active). |
2. | Natural Justice: (The PG through signed MOU will not unprocedural or unfairly remove or terminate any member of core staff). |
3. | Management of PCDF A/C: (PG only uses PCDF A/C for purposes of PCDF grant utilisation). |
4. | Financial Statement Submission: (PG has completed and signed Annual FS FY 2020/21 in MPGIS prescribed format and submitted within 9 months to the Office of the Auditor (OAG) before 31/12/2022). |
5. | Core Public Finance Management and Reporting Followed: (Accurate timely submission of quarterly reports, evidence of monthly financial briefings by PTr to the Premier and Executive, Salary Account of PG not misused) |
6. | Audit Report Presentation: (The PG has responded to the most recent audit report from OAG, has identified ways to address audit findings, and the audit report has been tabled in the PG Assembly) |
7. | Funding for PPAC Meetings: (4 PPAC meetings held and budgetary support in 2021/22 budget, and full time PPAC Secretary in place) |
8. | Procurement Compliance to procurement processes: (variations, retentions payments, threshold advertisements etc). |
9. | Participatory Planning Processes (e.g. Ward Development Committees (WDCs) involving in deciding, planning, and implementation of WDC projects with the PG. |
What a Province gets depends on whether it passed every MC that was assessed in the last financial year or not. A Province must pass every MC. Failing one MC means foregoing all the MCs. For example, in the current assessment that looks at 2021/22 FY, Provinces who passed the MCs will get rewarded in 2023/24 FY. The exact amount of what a passing Province gets is determined by the number of PMs the Province passed. Each PM has a dollar numerical value attached to it. A Province can pass every MC but failed on some PMs. The key is to pass the MCs as they are the minimum conditions.
Since the intervention by the PGSP to strengthen governance in the Provinces and the inception of PCDF through the PGSP as incentive for the Provinces to perform in the provision of services by adhering to enforcing compliances, there has been huge improvements with Central and Isabel so far being the only two Provinces that have secured Clean Audit Report. It must be noted that since independence there has not been any financial reports produced by the Provinces prior to PGSP intervention except in one occasion when one off yearly production of FS by two Provinces Malaita and Temotu in the early nineties was produced.
The PFGCC is chaired by the Deputy Secretary of the Ministry of Provincial Government and Institutional Strengthening, and co-chaired by the Deputy Secretary of the Ministry of Finance and Treasury.
The main functions of the PFGCC are to make deliberations on the Provincial Service Grants from the National Government such as the Rational for Provincial Services Grants, Current Usage of Provincial Services Grants by the Provinces, Level of Provincial Services Grants, Distribution of Provincial Services Grants among the Provinces, System of Administering Provincial Services Grants, Accounting for and Reporting of Provincial Services Grants, and Suggestions for Change and Reform in the above areas. The PFGCC is mandated to discuss issues relating to Intergovernmental Financing Arrangements, such as giving options for Reform of Intergovernmental Financing Arrangements, including Revenue Sharing.
The PGSP and its PCDF have been supporting the Provinces for over 13 years with infrastructures that make meaningful changes to the living conditions of the people of Solomon Islands. The recent statistics of PCDF infrastructures have just been tabulated below.
The project has so far delivered 1,549 projects at a total cost of Three Hundred and Nineteen Million, One Hundred and Twenty-Seven Thousand, Six Hundred and Thirty-Five Dollars (SBD319,127,635.66), see table below.
Item no. | Province | Project | Expenditure incurred | Ongoing Projects | Funds committed | % of total exp | People employed |
All Provinces | QTY | BSD | SBD | % | |||
1 | Administration | 191 | 82,672,301.66 | 11 | 5,298,177 | 25.91 | 1648 |
2 | Agriculture | 75 | 6,120,825.00 | 4 | 950,869 | 1.92 | 420 |
3 | Culture and Tourism | 32 | 8,121,145.00 | 2 | 152,880 | 2.54 | 399 |
5 | Education | 301 | 103,910,441.00 | 17 | 3,045,895 | 32.56 | 2057 |
6 | Electrification | 83 | 2,710,529.00 | 0 | – | 0.85 | 178 |
7 | Environment, Conservation/Disaster | 16 | 5,168,849.00 | 0 | – | 1.62 | 86 |
8 | Solid waste management | 12 | 1,681,920.00 | 0 | – | 0.53 | 40 |
9 | Health | 133 | 36,958,103.00 | 8 | 2,559,335 | 11.58 | 1168 |
10 | Water and Sanitation | 520 | 17,222,722.00 | 5 | 517,389 | 5.40 | 890 |
11 | Fisheries and Marine resources | 47 | 6,495,464.00 | 2 | 587,594 | 2.04 | 221 |
12 | Commerce | 38 | 20,626,589.00 | 3 | 1,499,121 | 6.46 | 422 |
15 | Works/Infrastructure Development | 66 | 18,065,473.00 | 2 | 1,422,046 | 5.66 | 540 |
17 | Youth and Sports | 7 | 3,358,989.00 | 0 | – | 1.05 | 125 |
18 | Women development | 19 | 4,450,022.00 | 2 | 458,010 | 1.39 | 221 |
19 | Forestry, Land and Natural Resources | 4 | 346,921.00 | 0 | – | 0.11 | 12 |
21 | Social Services | 3 | 1,102,187.00 | 0 | – | 0.35 | 44 |
22 | Finance and Treasury | 2 | 115,155.00 | 0 | – | 0.04 | 6 |
Total | 1549 | 319,127,635.66 | 56 | 16,491,316 | 100.00 | 8,477 |
The PCDF is the funding mechanism of the Provincial Strengthening Programme (PGSP) that was initiated by the Solomon Islands Government in 2004 and started in 2008/9 with the support of donors such as RAMSI, EU, UNCDF, UNDP.
Currently the PCDF is being boosted with the support from Donor Development Partners such as World Bank, and European Union through United Nations Development Programme through the Integrated Economic Development and Community Resilience (IEDCR) project and Provincial Governance Service Delivery.
PGSP Press