Minister of Finance Amr El-Garhy has signed a cooperation protocol with the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) with the aim of regulating transactions of the treasury into a single account and closing sub-accounts in the CBE by the end of December as part of the first phase, according to a press release by the ministry.
El-Garhy noted that 179 bank accounts affiliated to the Finance Ministry will be closed, with preparations being made to close 150 more in the second phase, out of a total of 2,850 accounts. The steps are part of a phased action plan to apply law No. 139 of 2006, known as the Governmental Accounting Law.
The law is meant to develop a more streamlined and transparent state budget.
The minister added that the electronic system for financial transactions will help implement the ministry’s plan for developing and monitoring the state’s monetary flow. He added that it will also generate more accurate financial data for officials to use, the press release said.
For his part, the deputy minister of finance for treasury, Mohamed Maait, said that the electronic system will create constant coordination between the CBE and the Finance Ministry to develop the state’s financial policy and tighten controls over its monetary flow as they are closely connected to the monetary policies managed by the CBE.
“Coordination was carried out between the department of banking transactions in the CBE and the Finance Ministry to look into all forms of cooperation in order to fully activate the electronic system,” said Abou Bakr Abdel Hameed, head of the financing department in the Finance Ministry.
