The Finance Minister will answer to us for the money he spent - Granger

The Finance Minister will answer to us for the money he spent – Granger

Dec 02, 2013 News

The joint parliamentary opposition—A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) and the Alliance For Change (AFC)—is currently in the process of reviewing a united approach in dealing with three financial papers that were laid in Parliament.
The documents were laid at the first official sitting of the National Assembly since parliament came out of recess—two sittings ago.
The three papers were then placed on the Order Paper for the House’s attention at the last sitting, but the absence of the Minister of Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh caused a delay in scrutiny during that sitting.

Leader of APNU David Granger

Two of the three papers were seen by Kaieteur News. One of the financial papers serves to inform the National Assembly that government went ahead and used $3,384,528,708 that was not approved at that level. The other is calling for an additional $1,261,596,480 as supplementary funding.
APNU leader, David Granger told Kaieteur News that his party will not allow the Finance Minister to get off scotch free with what he has done. This he said is referred to the unapproved spending.
He said that APNU and the AFC have met to discuss the way forward in dealing with the matter. He told this publication that no official course of action has been fully decided upon but the APNU and AFC are not inclined to support the request for money simply because the Minister has already breached the law of appropriation.
The Opposition Leader said that his party plans on ensuring that the Minister is sanctioned. He informed that a necessary action will be to bring the Minister before the Parliamentary Committee of Privileges and “let him answer…he will definitely be hearing from us.”
This year’s National Budget approved $31.35 billion less than what was originally presented to the House. Finance Minister Dr. Ashni Singh had presented a $208.8 billion budget on March 25. After a series of amendments, the budget was reduced to $177.4 billion.
The Opposition had cut the budgetary allocations set aside for the National Communications Network (NCN, Government Information Agency (GINA) and Guyana Power and Light Inc. (GPL)
Cuts were also made to the Ministries of Public Works and Health. But Minister of Finance Dr. Ashni Singh went ahead and spent, despite such actions by the Opposition.
According to a financial paper laid in parliament, the Office of the President through “Subsidies and contributions to Local Organizations” used $217,194,998; this was in addition to the money that was allocated to that line item. The document stated that that money was divided between NCN and GINA; GINA got $135,857,999 and NCN: $81,336,999.
It didn’t stop there; the government, through the Office of the Prime Minister, also spent $1,777,000,000 for capital transfer to the Guyana Power and Light Inc (GPL).
Then, under the Ministry of Public Works, government used $21,065,925 to aid in the completion of Hinterland airstrips and $80,000,000 as a grant for the acquisition of Civil Aviation equipment.
Also, for the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) Modernisation Project, government used $1,063,137,537 foreign cash and $65,432,848.
Further, under Ministry of Health – Regional and Clinical Services, saying its provisions for the Specialty Hospital Project, the government used $133,250,000 foreign cash and $34,456,400.