ALRAQABA . ISSUE 16
79
Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and UAE in order
to resume working and to carry out the entrusted
control and audit functions of SAB.
Following the liberation of our beloved country,
SAB President, the late Faris Al-Wogayan,
visited the office of SAB in Cairo. The then SAB
President, the Undersecretary, Mr. Youssef Al-
Othman, the Assistant Undersecretaries Mr.
Salman Belal and Mr. Ahmed Al-Khaled, put the
plan to return to Kuwait and resume working. It is
noteworthy that SAB was one of the first entities
that resumed working after liberation.
SAB continued its pioneering role in managing
crises under the exceptional circumstances that
thecountrypasses through, andparticularlyunder
the outbreak of COVID-19 and its implications. To
that end, SAB has established a working group to
follow up emergencies and study the government
entities contracting. The working group is to
help in facilitating the completion of topics that
are to be presented to SAB for pre-opinion, in
alignment with the provisions of articles (13) and
(14) of its Establishment Law No. (30) of 1964.
On March 11, 2020, the said working group
was established to facilitate procedures, ensure
prompt response to the needs of the entities that
are concerned with the Coronavirus crisis, and
to provide such entities with pre-approval of SAB
on their contracts.
During the period fromMarch 12 to June 29, 2020,
the working group provided its opinion on (849)
topics. A total of (545) topics were approved by
SAB with an approximate value of K.D (1,101)
billion. These topics included contracts that are
to be executed throughout several fiscal years.
Immediate savings to the State Treasury of
approximately K.D (44) million were achieved for
certain topics that were reviewed and studied by
SAB.
In addition, SAB participated in a video
conference with the World Bank on SAIs role
in taking precautionary procedures to face the
Coronavirus pandemic and the learned lessons
to improve SAIs’ work. It has also participated
in virtual discussions on the role of SAIs
under the contingency circumstances that the
world passes through due to the outbreak of
Coronavirus. Participants of the meeting included
100 representatives from the different SAIs
across the world. Besides, SAB participated in
a virtual workshop on “Methods to overcome all
obstacles that face construction projects and the
implementation of labor cities project in the State
of Kuwait”, which was organized by the Public
Services Commission headed by the Minister of
Commerce and Industry Mr. Khaled Al-Roudhan.
