7 Alternativ A Ras BRP Depi Dan Labus Pansioner

Sanjay Jagatsingh · 7 alternativ a ras BRP depi dan labus pansioner

State To Squander Billions, Again

The first time was when several billions of rupees of the fruits of our economic diplomacy were gifted to a sunset industry which at the start of the bean-counting reforms in 2005 represented a little over 4% of our economy. 10 years later its weight was four times smaller. Talk about a strategic blunder of epic proportions or is it a monumental skills mismatch? Naturally this was to be followed by sending our savings rate to a 30-year low and severing the link between international oil prices and what Mauritian voters paid to fill up their cars. To name just a few. So yeah, dumb policy-making had made Mauritius a lot more vulnerable and treaty risk a lot larger. Than it ought to have been.

Now another Minister wants to sink billions of a grant received from India -- who has millions to lift out of poverty -- into buildings we don't need partly because he's not happy with the amount of legroom he enjoys in our historic Parliament.

How To Clean Up Mumbai Smartly

Why The Debt-to-GDP Ratio Has Fallen

For sure it didn't happen by reducing wastage levels. Nope. That we know from reading the damning government audit report year after year. Instead, the Finance Minister did it mostly by never spending many of the billions he had budgeted over the last 4.5 years in typical bean-counting tradition:

1. The Empowerment fund has spent only Rs800 million over a 3-year period instead of the 1-billion-rupees-a-year pledge. That's Rs2.2 billion 'saved'.

2. By making us pay Rs3 billion for an apparent hedging mess at the STC through much higher pump prices than would warrant prevailing oil market prices.

3. Announcing 6 Rs1-billion funds in the June 2008 budget (Food security fund, Human Resource, Knowledge and Arts fund, MID fund, etc) but spending only a small fraction of them.

4. Not spending enough of the last 4-5 capital budgets.

5. Repackaging paragraph 271 as an additional stimulus package and setting aside a few more billions which were never to be spent.

6. VAT of 15% was kept on oil prices throughout the period they went all the way to USD147 a barrel. For instance VAT receipts on oil prices doubled from Rs1.65 billion to Rs3.3 billion in 12 short months from 2006 to 2007.

7. Depreciating our currency.

The Ultimate Red-Tape Machine

That would be a fitting name for the Empowerment Foundation which had blazed some new trails last year by... changing its name from the Empowerment Fund. That's because after 3 years in operation it has spent only Rs800 million instead of the Rs3 billion pompously announced by you know who. That's barely more than a quarter of the budgeted amount in case you're wondering.

The unspent Rs2.2 billion has gone towards reducing the deficit and debt-to-GDP ratio as per standard bean-counting practice. For sure it hasn't meant lower wastage levels. Nope. The damning government auditor's report constantly reminds us that this is yet another area where Sithanen has miserably failed to deliver - he referred to it as the bloody report in 2005 and promised to wage war against the Rs5 billion that's wasted every year.

It would be also interesting to find out about the administrative costs of this foundation and compare them to traditional public service delivery.