European Union’s (EU) support, within the framework of the Morocco-EU twinning, to the General Treasury of the Kingdom (TGR) demonstrates the European bloc’s constant commitment to accompany the Kingdom’s reforms dynamics, said, Noureddine Bensouda, Treasurer General of the Kingdom, on Monday.
Speaking at the opening of the seminar marking the end of the Morocco-EU Institutional Twinning, which links the TGR to the Directorate General of Public Finance (DGFIP-France), Bensouda stressed that “this support demonstrates, once again, the constant commitment of the EU to accompany the endogenous dynamics of reforms undertaken by our country in several areas, including that of public governance.”
This twinning, entitled “Support for the modernization of public financial management”, was an opportunity to share, at the institutional level, the convictions, expertise and experience feedback, he noted, presenting, on this occasion, his thanks to the EU delegation for its support to “this large-scale project.
He said in this regard that “this twinning came to support a set of reforms already launched by the TGR,” adding that the first is the reform of state accounting.
“This reform, everyone agrees, is the vector of a deep and inevitable transformation of the public financial culture. It goes far beyond a simple adaptation of accounting management methods. More than an information tool, accounting represents a real management and decision-making tool,” he said.
He further noted that “it remains understood that the implementation of such a reform, and the exercise of certification of accounts associated with it, is not a simple work. It is an arduous and demanding process.
The Treasurer General of the Kingdom said that the second reform relates to the modernization of control, stressing that the logic of performance and accountability, imposed by the Organic Law on the Finance Act, “should, today, be coupled with a real transformation of the roles of authorizers and accountants.
With this in mind, the overhaul of the control system led by the TGR, with the support of its partners, has been guided by two axes: on the one hand, the lightening of controls, based on the progress made since the implementation of the 2008 text.
Specifically, it is to proportion the extent of controls to financial issues and risks, and secondly the strengthening of the internal control system: by extending its functional scope for better management of risks, he said.
Regarding the third reform, Bensouda noted that it is related to the dematerialization which, according to him, is now a real lever for rationalization and security of the financial function.
“Driven by this conviction, the TGR has engaged for over a decade, it should be recalled, a major project of dematerialization of all these trades,” he argued.
He noted in this regard that all these reforms have supported the modernization of public financial management in Morocco according to a model that is unique, which respects its specificities and which places its human capital at the heart of all transformation projects.
The Moroccan official also added that modernization is a constant effort, which depends on “our ability to adapt and adapt our operating methods to provide better service to users.”
He further emphasized that “continued cooperation, both with the delegation of the European Union, the DGFIP or our other partners, is likely to allow our financial systems to continue to evolve, to approach the best international practices.
In addition, Bensouda said that the TGR has also made the training and development of its human resources and the development of their skills the key word and the cornerstone of all the reform projects in which it is engaged.
“As such, we have emphasized the need to modernize and transform the process and activities of training, through the diversification of tools used and the integration of new information technologies and communication,” he said.
