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Momodou
Denmark
11806 Posts |
 Posted - 22 Dec 2005 : 21:56:43
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HALIFA’S REACTION TO BUDGET SPEECH
By Abdoulie Dibba
In his reaction to the 2006 Budget speech, the Minority Leader and Member for Serrekunda Central Hon. Halifa Sallah indicated that the 2006 budget will enhance the hardship that is confronting people. Continuing his contribution he reminded his colleagues of their functions as National Assembly Members since they are coming close to the end of their mandate. He said their functions are clearly stipulated in section 1 (2) of the constitution, noting they derived their authority from the people and that they should exercise that authority to promote their general welfare. He went on to say that they are guided by the same constitution in terms of their strategic objective which is clearly spelt out in section 215 of the constitution dealing with economic objectives.
Halifa Sallah indicated that section 215(3) of the constitution categorically states that “Recognising that the most secure democracy is one that assures the basic necessities of life for its people, the state shall endeavour to establish an efficient, dynamic and self reliant economy whose underling principles shall include ensuring a balanced development of all parts of The Gambia, improvement in the quality of life in rural communities and redressing economic imbalances between rural and urban communities.” Hon. Sallah asserted that a Government must have strategic objectives and that is why the Secretary of state for Finance and Economic Affairs has spelt out the strategic objective of the Government. He said that he would like to remind his colleagues that there is the strategic objective of transforming the Gambia into a financial centre, a tourist paradise, trading and export oriented, agricultural and manufacturing base, a middle income country, striving on free market policies and a vibrant private sector, sustained by a well trained, skilled, healthy, self-reliance and enterprising population, guaranteeing a well balance eco-system and a decent standard of living for all under a system of Government based on the consent of the citizenry. Halifa Sallah pointed out that he would like to say that they are falling short of that strategic objective which is visualized in the government vision 2020. He said that he had carefully looked at the statement made by the Secretary of State for Finance and Economic Affairs and must state that this budget, is an enhancement of the hardship of the poor. He stressed that essentially that is what the budget constitute and that has been clearly stipulated on page 10 paragraph 53 of the budget. Halifa Sallah pointed out that paragraph 53 states that “The second set-back which was as a direct result of the PRGF suspension was that the $115 million fund pledged by donors during the 2002 Gambia was not disbursed.” “Thus, implementation of PRSP Programmes was undertaken within lower than anticipated budgetary resource envelope.” “Although macroeconomic stability has been restored in 2004 and 2005, the single biggest threat to government operations, the heavy domestic debt burden took a significant portion of the budget resources, thereby further reducing the budget funding for the PRSP Programmes. As we come to the end of the first PRSP implementation period the annual reviews have concluded that less than 40 percent of the PRSP programmes have been implemented.”
At this juncture Halifa Sallah noted that it is very clear from this statement of the Secretary of state that we are failing in our objective because the programmes are not being implemented as expected; and the reason why we are failing has also been clearly stated in paragraph 52 of the budget. Paragraph 52 stated that there was a strategic plan in 2001/03 and that the Gambia was expected to achieve that strategic plan in 2003, and the strategic plan, Halifa said, is what the Hon. SOS called the completion point of PRGF. Why couldn’t we achieve that completion point? Halifa asked. The answer Halifa said is clearly stipulated in paragraph 52 and that is, “The implementation process has been hindered by a number of set-backs that have made the overall PRSP process less successful.” “The most serious set-back was the suspension of the PRGF programme by the IMF in 2003, and because of the programme’s suspension, the Gambia could not reach HIPC completion point as planned in June 2003.” Why was it suspended? Halifa asked. He pointed out that it is suspended because of the fact that we have not been managing our public finances properly. Pure and simple! He noted that this has been clearly buttressed in paragraph 1 of the budget speech which states that “the primary objective of the 2006 budget is to improve public expenditure management.” This Halifa said clearly shows that lack of proper public expenditure management has led us to the situation in which we are today!
To be continued.
Source: Issue No. 98/05, 22-25 December,2005
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