Assembly approves budget for judiciary, SBC, ACCS and various other statutory bodies |28 November 2017
• Freezes R3.3 million from judiciary
Judiciary
The Ministry of Finance, Trade and Economic Planning was once again asked to freeze a substantial amount of budget allocation for yet another entity-- the judiciary.
The budget freeze was assigned to R3.3 million out of the approved R80, 417.94 million. The sum had been allocated partially for the purpose of payments to a local security firm called Marpol Security.
Juliana Esticot, the Supreme Court registrar, explained that the judiciary signed a two-year contract with the company to provide additional security for new judges, judges in the Supreme Court and other senior officials of the court.
She stated that the judiciary felt justified in doing so given the sensitivity of the judges’ work, especially since some had had threats made to their lives, as well as to the safety of their families and property.
While responding to elected member for St Louis Sandy Arrisol, Mrs Esticot revealed that because of the urgency of the situation, the issuance of the security services to Marpol Security had not followed the proper tender process.
Anse Etoile MNA Ahmed Afif staunchly opposed Mrs Esticot and stated: “The R3.3 million increases for security were done without any considerations for the regulatory laws. The judiciary has to abide by these rules no matter what.”
Mr Afif argued that the judiciary should have signed a relatively short-term contract with Marpol Security instead of a two-year contract.
Consequently he suggested the freezing of the R3.3 million until the judiciary re-tenders out the security contracts -- a proposal which gained approval from the majority members.
Another area of interest was the house rental allowance of R25,000 owed to every judge serving in the Supreme Court.
MNA Arrisol was particularly vocal on this issue and quizzed Mrs Esticot on why judges who live in their own homes are still entitled to the allowance.
Mrs Esticot replied that this clause has been prescribed in the Constitution and it would require an amendment for the judiciary to start doing otherwise.
The Judiciary Act stipulates that the President of the Court of Appeal, the Chief Justice and puisne judges “shall be entitled to free government housing or housing allowance of R25,000 in lieu thereof”.
Also debated upon were the new measures being undertaken to decrease the courts’ backlog, court fees, decentralisation of judicial proceedings, repairs to Palais de Justice and the construction of the new Magistrate Court, of which R45 million is expected to be financed through a grant offered by the Indian government.
Seychelles Broadcasting Corporation (SBC)
The members of the National Assembly (MNAs) have urged SBC to encourage and invest in more local contents.
This was unanimously expressed yesterday during the approval of the state-owned media corporation budget of R109,393.26 million.
Present during the session was the newly appointed chief executive of SBC, Bérard Duprès.
During the sitting, Port Glaud MNA Egbert Aglae was interested to acquire further details on SBC’s soft roll out to Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) project, planned to start as from December 1.
He was told that the cost for the consignment of 30,000 DTT set-top boxes has cost SBC around $1.3 million (approximately R18.2 million), a sum which has already been catered for in the 2017 budget.
In regards to salaries, Mr Duprès stated that he does not believe that workers should benefit from a bonus as well as a 13th month salary and added that discussion on the issue is ongoing within the senior level of the corporation and the board.
He stated that a compromise has been reached for this year but was not willing to expose additional information as this has not fully been communicated to the employees.
Responding to Mont Fleuri MNA Jean-François Ferrari’s query on salary inconsistencies at SBC, Mr Duprès assured the MNAs that SBC is in the process of streamlining and benchmarking its employees’ salaries in order for it to be attractive, and yet not place a “burden on taxpayers’ money”.
However a point of contention arose when it was made known that SBC’s board members were receiving more than double the allowance the current government policy allows for - that is R11,000 for ordinary members compared to the norm of R3,048; R13,000 for the vice-chairman compared to R3,430 and R14,000 for the chairman compared to R3,800.
The MNAs therefore requested that the executive branch of the government implements more stringent board policies to avoid disparity among board fees and number of members between different government entities.
Anti-Corruption Commission Seychelles and other statutory bodies
The National Assembly also approved the budget for the Anti-Corruption Commission Seychelles (ACCS), an amount of R11,956.46 million.
Its chief executive, May De Silva, was on hand to defend her budget and did not face much opposition from the MNAs.
She stated that the ACCS is currently working on 58 cases, two of which are expected to be brought to the attention of the Attorney General’s office by the end of January 2018.
The leader of government business, Charles de Commarmond, expressed his concern that ACCS is renting from a private landlord.
He argued that it would be preferable for the ACCS to move into a state-owned facility in order to avoid any conflict of interest.
Once the budget for ACCS was approved, the National Assembly also approved the budgets for the office of the Auditor General (R17,71.76 million), the office of the Ombudsman (R3,222.27 million), the Public Service Appeals Board (R903.53 thousand), the Constitutional Appointments Authority (R1,932.64 million), the Electoral Commission (R6,747,32 million), the Public Officers Ethics Commission (R2,456 million), the National Human Rights Commission (R1,078.56 million) and the Seychelles Media Commission (R2,988. 65 million).