Let Government work to improve efficiency

By David Sempala

After the budget speech and state of the nation address by president Museveni last year in June there was a consensus with government cycles that the efficiency of government can make a difference to a country’s economic performance.  In private sector where I come from, business efficiency is an everyday norm.

The high quality of the public institutions (and more generally of governments) is viewed as necessary to assure that policies have a positive and lasting effect on income. Taking for granted the importance of good government other questions naturally arise: how can government efficiency be measured? Why do some countries have better governments than others? In other words can policy choices affect the quality of government?

In her budget speech last year, the minister of finance, planning and economic development Maria Kiwanuka announced attempts to reform public sectors departments by focusing on one of the most important aspect of running any government that is improving government business efficiency.

The mission of this Initiative was to monitor and promote progress in making Government work better, faster, and more efficiently and holds executive departments and agencies accountable for obtaining results consistent with this the 2012 Budget strategy. In her budget strategy she pointed out three core priorities to lower the cost of doing business and marshal private sector investment in Uganda.

These included: Rehabilitation and expansion of road and electricity infrastructure, Research and development to improve productivity, and improving business efficiency by streamlining regulatory rules and business licensing. I am patiently waiting in June 2013 for Madam Minister to present an account on how far we have achieved in the budget strategy laid out last year.

There is no doubt that in these challenging times, public service organizations must provide fast, efficient services in the face of tightened budgets and increased citizen expectations, often with inflexible or outdated technology infrastructure and a shrinking workforce.

We’re all aware in Uganda that most public sector departments with exceptions of the few, are performing badly and not servicing citizens to their expectations. To varying degrees they suffer from a number of well-known bureau pathologies inefficiency, centralization, lack of capacity, corruption, and poor accountability and legitimacy.

The need to improve government efficiency and accountability is therefore obvious. Recently in our internal business discussions with chief Executives, we looked at key projects which could be coordinated together- the national Id project, Sim-card registrations, updating election register, and Uganda population census. In countries with minimal resources and with so many priorities at hand, such projects could be planned & executed together to save resources and minimize on corruption incidences.

Given that resources in the public sector are mostly generated through taxes and taxes create distortions in the allocation of resources and thus constrain economic growth, it is essential that public expenditures are used to improve long-term growth perspectives and take equity considerations into account. Improved efficiency and effectiveness in government not only helps maintain the fiscal discipline but also is instrumental in promoting social and economic structural reform agenda of any country.

In the current debate it is the institutional view that informs most of the actual reform initiatives, and its political leadership that will lay reform measures to improve efficiency and accountability. In my opinion, four critical elements should be adopted if were re to improve public efficiency.

Direct public sector costs must be cut and labor discipline raised so as improve resource use; secondly, private sector-style management practices must be applied to increase flexibility in decision making. In addition competition in the public sector through term contracts and tendering must be increased, as rivalry is the key to lower costs and better standards. Equally controls must be shifted from inputs to outputs, to stress results rather than procedures.

The Government should also devote much attention to the issue of public accountability, not only because of responsibility to the public, but also because of the need to maintain public trust in the Government. This is particularly so since the Government is extensively involved in activities that touch upon the lives of people in general. Apart from the Parliament of Uganda, IGG and other institutions which provides an important form of control over the executives and where government actions are brought into account, the Government can devise a stronger mechanisms to check on public accountability beyond what is seen today.

 Efficiency is an increasingly core component of government reform. However, reviews of government production costs and productivity In Uganda indicate that governments may be getting less efficient. Many officials of government seem to be lamenting labor pains, I am sure the public requires babies now. Government should actively address this topic through the introduction of new practices for instance innovation in public services; scaling up the use of efficient practices; improving the use of measurement and analytical tools; and strengthening management incentives to help drive efficiency.

The writer is a Chief Executive Officer of Royalway Media Ltd- a Public Relations & Marketing Communications firm in Uganda. He can be reached at: Sempala@royalwaymedia.com