The initial objective of this project was to assist the CWSB recover colossal amounts owed to the board by the six water services providers (WSPs) under it. Based on the analysis of the debt situation which required us to review the financial management systems of all the institutions, the causal factor for the high indebtedness was mainly because of the poor financial management systems including poor financial reporting by both the CWSB and its WSPs. This therefore generated the second part of the consultancy whereby we had to undertake training and capacity building of all the financial staff under CWSB including its WSPs through FMS processes and best practices.

The key activities undertaken included the following:

• Initially undertaking the analysis of the indebtedness between CWSB and the six WSP including establishment of the causal factors. These were found to be week institutional structure which resulted into poor financial management.
• Key recommendation was to assist the WSPs come up and implement proper financial management structures which included the requirement for both organisation strengthening and capacity building mainly on the financial management systems.
• Training the selected teams of financial staff on best practices of maintain the accounts and financial reporting. The WSP staff was trained on the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and the WSP staff was trained on IPSAS.
• Trained the teams on the development of accounting and financial policies and procedures manual. This covered not only capacity building to the selected team from each of the WSP and CWSB, but also assisting them to develop the master manual from which each institution was to customizes and produce their own
• Capacity-build the selected working group on the development of specifications to assist in the procurement of the best FMIS solutions. This includes assisting the team in the development of the specifications.
• Assisting the WSPs to reconcile the debts owed to them and cleaning their balance sheet as part of rectifying their financial reporting system. This included development of a credit policy based on the best practices and assisting each of the WSP in debt collection
• Assisted each of the WSP develop proper budgets for the financial year 2015/16 and forecasts to facilitate assessment of their ability to meet the debt repayment to CWSB and financial and operational restructuring which may be needed for each to be financially stable to meet its debts in future.