By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Christie administration yesterday brought a resolution to the House of Assembly to borrow $33m from the Inter-American Development Bank to improve the management of the country’s finances.

The object of the loan is to help the government to better use fiscal resources by monitoring projects and programmes more effectively and by improving the ability to collect data and provide quality statistics.

The objective is also to improve how funds are allocated and to modernise the country’s public procurement system.



During his contribution on the matter, State Minister for Finance Michael Halkitis also responded to his critics regarding value added tax (VAT), which was implemented at the beginning of last year with the promise that it would reduce the country’s national deficit and debt.

“If a boulder is careening down the hill and you want to stop it and push it back on top of the hill, the first thing to do is slow it down, then stop it, then you have to begin pushing it up again,” he said, trying to illustrate that reducing the national debt won’t be an action that begins immediately.

However, he said within “three or four” years the government expects the national debt to be “totally eliminated.”

When she offered the opposition’s official response to the government’s resolution, Long Island MP Loretta Butler-Turner attacked the administration over its lack of transparency in relation to numerous aspects of its financial management.

She also questioned whether key positions in the Ministry of Finance are filled as required by law.

Several weeks ago the Christie administration announced that John Rolle would leave his position as financial secretary to become governor of the Central Bank of the Bahamas.

Mrs Butler-Turner said: “Who is the current financial secretary and who, in accordance with the VAT legislation, is the VAT comptroller in charge of inland revenue and other things? When you’re talking about transparency and pushing things forward and being able to do this and that, right now we have millions of dollars coming into the public purse and being spent and I don’t think we have anyone confirmed in the position to oversee these things. So who’s carrying out the work?”

In his contribution last night, FNM Deputy Leader Peter Turnquest – who is MP for East Grand Bahama – cautioned the government against more borrowing. He told the House of Assembly that the country was not out of the economic doldrums as he questioned the need for accruing more debt.