That the Committee for Financial Supervision CFT has approved a 30 million Antillean guilder loan for St. Maarten (see related story) is obviously good news. While Government formally received the right to borrow when country status went into effect per 10-10-10, it had been unable to do so up to now due to structural deficits and cost overruns.
About NAf. 8.3 million as part of the planned investments for the prison and Tax Office has to be included in the 2017 budget via an amendment on the capital account. In addition, permission must still be sought from CFT to spend NAf .3.1 million or near 10 per cent of the total amount reserved for unforeseen expenditures on something else.
Finance Minister Richard Gibson nevertheless deserves credit for finally getting public finances in order, to make the loan possible. Hopefully, especially the Tax Office project will greatly enhance fiscal compliance to increase income as intended.
The latter is very important, because borrowing money also means having to repay in some form, shape or fashion. Certain things such as improving the penitentiary simply cannot wait any longer, but for now the focus should therefore mostly remain on productive investments.
