The Public Accounts Committee has raised concerns on an agreement between the government and telecom giants Amalgamated Telecom Holdings.

In its scrutiny of the Auditor General’s report of 2005 and 2006, the Committee said ATH was being given 80% of its dividends received by Government from FINTEL as management fees.

However, the Committee found that the management work for which the fee was being paid, was not clearly visible and on top of that it had to pay VAT to FIRCA.

The Committee stated that it appeared as though the government was locked into an agreement which legally could not be reviewed until the end of the Agreement and it is of real concern as the government was losing a lot of money through an agreement that severely disadvantaged the State.

The Committee also noted that the Finance Ministry allowed itself room to maneuver by overestimating its budgetary requirements for the year, both in revenue and expenditure, so that there were savings recorded, even when the estimates were revised downwards.

They also found the problems of unpresented cheques at the end of each year when Ministries and departments tried to utilize all unspent funds.

The Committee has recommended that the Ministry must be more stringent and stop this practice and disallow the presentation of cheques by December 15th.