Centralisation of public revenue to help achieve greater spending control

Muscat: The Ministry of Finance has said that combining various departments that record the sources of government income and spending will lead to improved control over public finances.
The ministry’s Director of Media and Communication, Khalid bin Saif Al Busaidi, referred to circular number 18/2020, which stated that the plans to centralise the government’s revenue record system would need to proceed as planned.
“The project to set up a single treasury account is one of several steps the ministry is working on to improve control over public spending and government revenues,” he said, adding that other projects being set up to improve its capabilities include the government financial data management system, programme budgeting, and performance management systems.
Speaking to Al Shabiba, the Times of Oman’s sister Arabic publication, Al Busaidi added, “The single treasury account project is a single key bank account or a set of linked bank accounts used for government revenues and thus spending shall be through a single government account in the near future.”
He added: “With the issuance of financial circular No. 18/2020, we proceeded with the first stage of implementing the centralisation of government revenues under a single account with the Central Bank of Oman. This aims to have all government revenues deposited in a single account, and the transfer of revenues from government bodies to this single account with the CBO shall not take more than five working days from their collection.
“The single account would help the government manage cash flows, and spending in a more efficient way,” Busaidi added. Compliance with collection of revenues shall cover all government, military and security bodies which shall transfer revenues directly to the account of the Ministry of Finance. Revenues will not be deposited directly with the ministry, but shall be done through this account. Although revenues must be transferred to the ministry within five days of collection, there are exceptions to some government bodies that are allowed up to a week to deposit these into the required account.