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Assurance of a rigorous handling of the Budget

It is said that deficit reduction is taking place

SANTO DOMINGO. The Controller General of the Republic, Rafael Germosen Andujar, stressed that this institution intervenes before, during and after the elaboration of the General Budget of the State, which allows it to have a greater knowledge and control of the handling of the line items of this state institutions.

He reported that last week he was working on finding out what were the government's priorities and establishing amounts and ceilings.

"With regard to the Budget I can tell you that this administration is being highly disciplined and rigorous in its fulfillment," explained the official.

He said that all the institutions of the government work in coordination with the President of the Republic regarding the budget, because he is committed to a reduction of the fiscal deficit of 2.8% during these first three years.

"And this year we have this goal and because of that we say ‘before', because the first thing was that several institutions began to yell and he told them: "gentlemen we have to tighten our belts because we cannot increase any of the budgetary line items," narrated Germosen Andujar, after explaining what President Danilo Medina said regarding the Budget.

He recalled that Medina said that the objectives of each institution should be achieved with the budget that they had assigned.

As he spoke regarding the school construction program, which is being carried out by the Ministry of Education, they had budgeted 10,000 schoolrooms on one side and 8000 on another side, and he explained: "what is happening or what happened with the budget? Look there is no mistake, it is that when they budgeted eight; they budgeted 10 in reality, 8000, plus remember that Education has a program of maintaining schoolrooms, then these two (thousand) correspond to this program of school maintenance."

The official pointed out that the big challenge after the schools are built is maintenance which, he considered, is obligatory and necessary, because the schools and the physical structures deteriorate over time if they are not given maintenance.

"This is the big challenge later on in the execution of this initial program, because the people say, "good for education they're going to have all the money in the world because of the 4%"; not so, because the maintenance of all these schools is also going to be very heavy," he said.

He indicated that the budget for the Ministry of Education has only been executed by 46% because there was a time of this year that tax collections went down, but this does it mean that by the end of the year they will not have completed their budget.

The Controller as 1400 employees; 72% are auditors

Of the 1400 collaborators of the Controller General of the Republic, 72% are auditors, noted the head of the monitoring agency, Rafael Germosen Andujar.

Regarding this particular item, he explained that the auditors are professionals in different areas. "We have engineering auditors we have civil engineers, agricultural engineers, because we have to apply certain expertise both in the area of farming, as well in as the area of civil constructions. We have accountants, we have economists. Now we are practically recruiting, or are going to recruit in the immediate future medical doctors in order to deal with the health institutions," he noted for the reporters.

The official explained that at the headquarters of the Controller General there are four departments, and in each state institution there is an auditing unit.

Preliminary control

The Controller General carries out a preliminary control, which is to say the verification, monitoring, and validation of the payments by the institutions of the state. "Before the reception of their payment, the Controller General has to give his approval for the payment to be carried out," he said.

More issues

It isn't about arguing, but rather have the reports understood

"Would you like to have an audit report tell you:" look you are weak in this or that, or we found a deficiency in this or that? How would you feel with the term ‘deficiency', with the term ‘weak', these are bitter, aggressive words.

This was the example given by the Controller of the Republic, Rafael Germosen and of our, regarding the way in which the institution he leads does not handle the results of the audits carried out in this state institutions. In this sense, he noted that the conclusions of the evaluations are considered opportunities for the entities to improve their functioning.

"Why tell them that they are weak, deficient, that there is an irregularity, when in this culture "irregularity" is synonymous with fraud, and it is not like that, and an irregularity is something that was not done in a regular manner but it does not necessarily imply fraud," he said.

Four years are not sufficient for Danilo

The Controller of the Republic, Rafael Germosen Andujar, joins the list of those that are arguing for the reelection of President Danilo Medina.

The official feels that the administration of the President is working for benefit of the Dominican people. In this sense, he pointed out that if the actions of the Chief of State are "good", why change him?

"Now I'm going to ask you a question. You contract a girl to work in your house, a contract for four years, the girl is clean, efficient, she takes care of you like a prince and all that. The four years are up, but the contracts said that it was four, are you going to fire her? The head of the Controller General's office let it be known that if President Medina does not govern for a consecutive second term it puts at risk the confidence that the people have deposited in the government. "Anyway, I believe that the people are sovereign, and we are in a democracy, and whatever happens will be best for the Dominican people," he noted.