Government-by-Government Assessments: Egypt
During the review period, the government made significant progress by publishing, within a reasonable period, audits that covered the entire annual executed budget. Its budget documents were widely and easily accessible to the public, including online. Information on debt obligations was publicly available online, except major state-owned enterprise debt. Budget documents did not include allocations to state-owned enterprises. Publicly available budget documents did not specify expenditures to support executive offices. The information in the budget was generally reliable, but incomplete. Actual revenues and expenditures reasonably corresponded to those in the enacted budget. Military and intelligence budgets were not sufficiently subject to parliamentary or civilian public oversight. The supreme audit institution did not meet international standards of independence, and while it published timely reports that covered the entire budget, the reports did not contain substantive findings, recommendations, and narratives. The government specified in law or regulation and appeared to follow in practice the criteria and procedures for awarding natural resource extraction contracts and licenses. The government did not always make natural resource extraction awards publicly available. The sovereign wealth fund had a sound legal framework but did not disclose its source of funding or general approach to withdrawals.
Egypt’s fiscal transparency would be improved by:
- Making information on major state-owned enterprise debt publicly available;
- Including in budget documents allocations to, earnings from, and debt information of major state-owned enterprises;
- Providing in the budget a substantially complete picture of the government’s revenues and expenditures;
- Breaking down expenditures to support executive offices in the budget;
- Eliminating off-budget accounts or subjecting them to adequate oversight and audit;
- Subjecting military and intelligence budgets to adequate parliamentary or civilian public oversight;
- Ensuring the supreme audit institution meets international standards of independence;
- Ensuring audit reports contain substantive findings;
- Consistently making basic information on natural resource extraction awards publicly available; and
- Disclosing the sovereign wealth fund’s source of funding and general approach to withdrawals.