Gov’t dips into Treasury for $84B more

Nov 26, 2024 News

…another $25B allocated for Wales gas project

Senior Minister with Responsibility for Finance and the Public Service, Dr. Ashni Singh (Gov’t dips into Treasury)

By Davina Bagot

Kaieteur News- Minister with Responsibility for Finance and the Public Service, Dr. Ashni Singh on Monday tabled two financial papers in the National Assembly, seeking an additional $84.5B from the national Treasury.

Financial Paper Number Three relates to advances from the contingency fund for the period 2024-11-07 to 2024-11-22 and totals $456,851,845 for current estimates.

Meanwhile, Financial Paper Number Three seeks a supplementary provision of $84,074,229,401 for the period ending 2024-12-31. It should be noted that most of the advances made from the Contingency Fund, according to Financial Paper Number Three relates to charges for security services.

In the meantime, a whopping $25.3B of the $84B requested in Financial Paper Number Four is for payments to the contractor of the Natural Gas Liquids and Power Plant, being constructed at Wales, West Bank Demerara.

This follows an $80B allocation in this year’s National Budget to the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) for the project. It was explained that the provision of the additional resources is required to facilitate payments as a result of accelerated implementation.

Additionally, OPM has requested an additional $422.8M for small hydro projects. The Ministry of Agriculture has requested a total of $2,971,767,888 for the work programme of the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA).

To support the Oil and Gas Sector Development Programme, the Ministry of Natural Resources is seeking $125M, while the Ministry of Public Works is seeking an additional 223.8M.

According to the Supplementary Paper, the Ministry of Health, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Home Affairs want $4.5B, $1.1B and $1.4B, respectively. Minister Singh has requested that the two financial papers be debated in the National Assembly on Wednesday.

The tabling of the two financial papers come only three months and 16 days following the approval of Financial Papers Number One and Two in the National Assembling on August 9. The two papers totaling $40B were approved following a nine-hour long debate in the House.

Financial Paper One, for Current Estimates, totaled $8,566,812,000 while Financial Paper Two for Capital estimates totaled $32,182,604,021. It should be noted that this year’s National Budget, the largest to date was approved in the National Assembly on February 2, 2024 to the tune of $1.146 trillion.

Once cleared by Parliament, this year’s Budget will be increased to $1.270 trillion.

(Gov’t dips into Treasury for $84B more)

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