Member of the National Assembly André Claudel Lubaya says the government headed by President Fèlix Tshisekedi used the hosting of the 2023 Francophonie IX Games recently held in Kinshasa to dip their hands into the national purse.
Lubaya’s comments come after Minister of Finance Nicolas Kazadi announced that government had spent a whooping over US$320 million to host the Games that intially had a budget of just US$48 million.
For operational expenses only, Kazadi claimed that the budget had increased from US$12 million to US$78 million while the investment expenditure profilerated from US$36 million to US$246 million.
Kazadi and government’s announcement has been described as an unacceptable act of embezzlement and misappropriation of public funds for those in power to enrich themselves.
“Presented [Tshisekedi] as a global success and an historical reference, the Games of the Francophonie organized by the DRC were, in reality, nothing more than a grave for public finances, of which 324 million US dollars were sucked into purposes of illicit enrichment of different parties” Lubaya said.
Lubaya bemoaned the irresponsibility of the Tshisekedi regime to defraud the country that has millions of people languishing in abject poverty or health workers who have gone unpaid for as many as 12 months.
“No explanation will suffice to justify such an increase except the insatiable bulimia of the various stakeholders. With these appalling figures, the country has been defrauded with great success, in a spectacle of games and lights, for the benefit of a core of politicians, civil servants and financial delinquent contractors, who mercilessly inflated the organization’s figures.”
Other political leaders have also voiced out their concern of alleged inflation of figures on various national projects by the Tshisekedi government.
