Budget preparations…High Court ruling on cuts causes pause

Oct 30, 2013 News

With national budget presentation being just about five months away, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) is awaiting the High Court ruling on the legality of budget cuts before any moves at negotiation or compromise can be made.
That was the position stated by the Party’s General Secretary, Clement Rohee, at a press conference held on Monday at Freedom House.
At A Partnership for National Unity (APNU)’s last press conference, Opposition Leader David Granger had no qualms about stating that the national budget is condemned to suffer the same fate as the last two years, if all the issues that existed before are still there.
He told media operatives that if the National Communications Network (NCN) and the Government Information Agency (GINA) do not pull up their proverbial socks, budgetary allocations set aside for both agencies will be in jeopardy.
Rohee, asked to comment on his government’s collaboration with the opposition and the likely reaction of more budget cuts, said that the PPP is not in possession of a “crystal ball” to anticipate what is going to happen.
He told reporters that the most he could say “politically speaking, is that you will never have a budget to the satisfaction of the opposition. The budget, usually or by convention, is a responsibility of the government of the day and I haven’t noted any indication that the government wishes to resign from that responsibility.
“But that is why usually when the budget is presented the government is expected to take blows from the opposition, because in most countries, the Opposition is not fully satisfied.”
Rohee pointed out that the High Court is likely to rule, soon, on the case of Budget cuts.
“I would say let us hold our breath until the court ruling is made on this subject and that will provide guidance for all the Parties on this subject in the future.”
The General Secretary said that in the meantime, from his understanding, the Ministry of Finance continues to invite stakeholders to participate in consultations with respect to the budget.
Asked to list some of the “stakeholders” who were invited, since APNU said it has not been, Rohee responded, “I can’t answer for APNU; I cannot say with any certainty, that they were invited.”
Last Friday, Granger told the media that the Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh neglected to invite APNU’s Shadow Minister of Finance, Carl Greenidge, to hammer out the framework on the 2014 budget.
The Opposition Leader told reporters that there are many issues that need to be addressed, changed and ventilated during the ongoing budget preparations.
Granger sought to explain that his party’s move to instigate budget cuts is driven by principles. He affirmed that should there be no changes at NCN and GINA, as it relates to impartial media coverage, APNU’s axe will fall on allocations set aside for both agencies.
The joint parliamentary opposition—APNU and the Alliance For Change (AFC)—has been arguing that GINA and NCN only provide coverage for the ruling administration.
Last year, the opposition called for the NCN board report on alleged fraud in the organization as a prerequisite to grant the agency its budgetary allocation.
Just as was the case last year, the allocations set aside this year for the National Communications Network (NCN) -$81,337,000 and Government Information Agency (GINA) – $135,858,000, were reduced to $1 each.
However, the capital funding remained as provided for by the government with NCN having $65M and GINA $13M.

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