President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi has issued a law to tie 10 percent of special funds annual revenues to the state budget for the 2014/15 fiscal year, Finance Ministry spokesperson Mesbah Qotb told Ahram Online on Monday.

"Special funds" are monies raised by state institutions through means other than customs or taxes, such as hospital fees or parking tickets.

“The move is not new, the law is issued on an annual basis for each financial year,” Qotb added.

In the fiscal year 2013/14, the government took 20 percent of the cumulative balance of special funds for the state budget which amounted to LE4.5 billion. While in fiscal year 2012/13, it appropriated 20 percent of special funds revenues to the budget.

However, some of the special funds are exempted from the decision because they finance improvements in public hospitals or pension funds.

Last year, state-owned Al-Ahram newspaper cited a report by the Central Auditing Organisation saying that 6,061 accounts of the controversial private funds worth LE38.6 billion, of which LE5.8 billion are in foreign currencies, had been transferred to a unified account in the central bank.

But the cumulative balance now exceeds LE40 billion, according to Qotb.

Egypt’s state budget forecast for the financial year 2014/15 has expenses projected to amount to LE789 billion and revenues at LE549 billion, while the deficit is forecast to stand at 10 percent of the country's GDP (LE240 billion) compared to a LE243 billion deficit (12 percent of GDP) in the fiscal year 2013/14.