Kinshasa, May 22nd, 2021 (CPA).- The 21st President of the Congolese National Assembly, Christophe Mboso N’Kodia Pwanga, received in audience, this Friday, May 21st, Mr. Jolke Oppewal, Ambassador of the Netherlands accredited to the Republic Democratic Republic of the Congo. With the Dutch diplomat, the speaker of the Lower House discussed several political and economic issues, in particular the mechanisms to be put in place to increase the government’s budget base and especially the role of Parliament in the transparency of revenues and contracts of the mining industry.
“I paid a courtesy visit to get to know the President of the National Assembly. We discussed a lot of points of interest. But I would like to highlight in particular the one relating to improving the government’s budget base, « the Dutch diplomat said at the outset. To be more precise, the Dutch diplomat said that they discussed various possible supports from his country to increase public revenue, especially since in light of the program unveiled by Prime Minister Sama Lukonde, the government needs to much more funds. “We discussed the role of Parliament in the transparency of revenues and contracts in the mining sector.
This is the wealth of the DRC and it is very important that all these revenues from the sector be channeled into the state coffers. This is not currently the case,”said diplomat Oppewal. It is important for him to improve transparency with the support of partners. “And here too, we as a partner, if we can go with initiatives of transparency, renovation of contracts, but to see how certain financial flows enter our home in the Netherlands in the post office boxes. On this, there is a responsibility to work together, because it is not a purely Congolese problem, but an international one which requires that we start to organize with private sector companies and how the people, the government and the Congolese Parliament can have better control and better transparency over this sector,”Mr. Jolke Oppewal added. When asked how the Netherlands thinks of dealing with all these questions of great importance, the Dutch diplomat explains: “As a partner within the European Union and as a Netherlands which are close to all questions relating to the rule of law, democracy … It is support as a traditional partner but it is not for us to decide but we are there to support”. Regarding the nature and volume of this support to improve transparency in the mining sector in order to improve the government’s base, Mr. Oppewal recalled that the Netherlands is on the program with a lot of organizations which help to increase transparency.
This support is in various programs implemented in the east of the country with programs to improve stability and manage to control the financial flows of mines. ACP/