The Ministry of Interior said that it has discovered irregularities in the work of some commune officials who allegedly took IDPoor cards and Wing cards meant for vulnerable and poor people and pregnant women with children under the age of 2 who were entitled to the cash assistance programme during the Covid-19 pandemic in order to withdraw the money from Wing counters for themselves.
In a letter to capital and provincial governors, the Ministry of Interior said: “Recently there have been alleged irregularities such as charging services from people who came to verify their names to receive payment, collusion, and fraud with IDPoor cards and Wing cards used to withdraw money from the beneficiaries of the cash assistance programme.”
The letter signed by Minister of Interior Sar Kheng on December 9 read that the capital and provincial governors have to instruct commune administrations to absolutely honour the principles and procedures of ongoing cash assistance programme implementation.
The letter instructed the governors to prevent the irregularities while implementing the cash assistance programme for at-risk families in response to inflationary pressure and the social protection cash programme for at-risk families affected seriously by the floods.
According to the letter, the governors must instruct commune chiefs not to give usernames and passwords of the beneficiaries of the programme to others.
“They must avoid colluding to include their relatives, brothers and sisters and friends who are not poor and vulnerable or affected into the cash assistance programme. They must not charge service fees from people and must not withdraw money from the cash assistance programme for any reason,” the letter said.
The ministry instructed the governors to take stringent measures against any commune officials who engaged in misconduct related to any cash assistance programme.
