Finance Minister seeks to restore monies cut from 2014 Budget

Jun 19, 2014 News

…Dr. Luncheon cites constitutional grounds, court rulings

By Gary Eleazar

Government has initiated moves to restore the money that was axed from the 2014 Budget, including the contentious

Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh as he made his way to the chambers in March last to present the 2014 Budget.

allocations for the Specialty Hospital, the National Communications Network and GINA.
The announcement came yesterday when Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr. Roger Luncheon, held his weekly post Cabinet briefing and informed media operatives of the “restoration of appropriations.”
Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh, had presented a $208.8B budget on March 25, last, and after a series of amendments, it was reduced to $177.4B following action by the political opposition.
Dr. Luncheon told media operatives yesterday that the move by the Ministry of Finance is backed by constitutional provisions as well as court rulings.
Yesterday, Dr. Luncheon informed media operatives that the Finance Minister addressed Cabinet when it met on Tuesday “on his resort to the use of restoration of expenditure beyond that which was voted, that was appropriated and indeed it was the focus of his presentation and the basis for the use of the restoration of the appropriations.”
According to Dr. Luncheon, the Finance Minister “relied on constitutional grounds and on rulings of the constitutional court to initiate his exercise of restoration of appropriation in the 2014 fiscal year.”
He said that the restoration of the money extends beyond the Office of the President to the eight other cuts that were made.
A total of $19B was cut from the allocation for the Low Carbon Development Strategy. The opposition at the time argued that the money has not yet been approved by the Inter-American Development Bank, but once it is approved, the government can return to the National Assembly and ask for approval.
The second largest cut was $5.6B from the Ministry of Public Works. The opposition had only intended to cut $5.3B for the expansion of the Cheddi Jagan International Airport expansion plan, citing lack of transparency.
However, the opposition had no choice but to cut funding for the airport expansion plan and other transport projects, including for hinterland airstrips, the Civil Aviation Authority and the Ogle Airport.
The third largest cut was $5.2B in subsidies for the Guyana Power and Light Incorporated. The other cuts were $1.25B for the Specialty Hospital on the grounds that there was a lack of transparency, and a total of $217.1M GINA and the state-run TV and radio NCN, under the grounds that the entities were only pushing propaganda and shutting out opposition voices.
The first of the financial papers detailing the restorations will be tabled in the House today when the National Assembly meets, according to Dr. Luncheon.
He noted, too, that the Financial Paper will not account for the entire sum of money that was initially disapproved in the House but rather, over the course of the coming months the Minister will be bringing more.
Pressed to elaborate on the grounds on which the Minister is restoring the money, Dr. Luncheon said that the constitution specifically addresses expenditure and shortages for agencies in discharging their work programme in any fiscal year.
He said that the constitution offer remedies that “we have collectively termed restoration, but of course it carries with it the specifics of the constitutional remedies and that is to say that restoration indeed refers to a range of constitutional remedies to provide for expenditure that has not been appropriated in any fiscal year.”
Dr. Luncheon said too that the details of rulings that the Minister is relying on is known and clear, adding too, that the court ruling has been used by the Minister in the “to undo the unconstitutional acts that have been perpetrated by the opposition.”
According to Dr. Luncheon some of the restoration will be justified using constitutional grounds while others will be defended using the court rulings.
Asked about the return of the specific expenditure that the Opposition deemed contentious such as the allocations for the Specialty Hospital and the CJIA expansion, Dr. Luncheon responded by saying “I can’t imagine having had the issues ventilated fully by the Ministries and the administration that attention of the restoration exercise would exclude the hospital and CJIA.”