Survey Says Cambodia Lacks Fiscal Transparency
The government has failed to improve transparency of its finances, according to a global report released yesterday, which ranks Cambodia among the worst countries in the world for openness over budgets. The Washington-based International Budget Partnership’s Open Budget Survey 2012- conducted in Cambodia by NGO Forum- assessed what information was available relating to each country’s public spending. The survey, which scored Cambodia 15 out of 100-meaning budget information made public is “scant or none”-aims to improve financial transparency and accountability, along with reducing corruption and waste in public spending. Cambodia’s score of 15 is unchanged from the last survey in 2010, meaning the country is in the bottom 20 percent, and is the lowest- scoring country in South East Asia save from Burma which scored zero. Phenn Rithipol, chief of the Ministry of Economy and Finance’s budget bureau, said he had “no opinion on the score” Cambodia had been given, but said the Government was reforming the way it managed its budgets. “The reason why we don’t publish reports is because of financial issues,” he said, adding that people seeking information should go to the relevant ministry and simply ask for it.” … “Sometimes they are busy so they will ask you to wait.”
