PHILIPSBURG--Finance Minister Richard Gibson has received approval from the Committee for Financial Supervision CFT, to delay the approval of the 2016 budget until January 31, 2016. By law, the budget for the coming year should be established by December 15.
CFT Chairman Age Bakker told the press on Tuesday, the task of incorporating the terms in the targeted instruction from the Kingdom Council of Ministers to get the country’s financial house in order is “a formidable task.”
Up to now, Government had not fully met any of the terms of the targeted instruction although “progress has been made” by the previous Marcel Gumbs Cabinet. “Urgent action us needed” since the November-1 deadline for meeting the terms of the instruction has passed and Government wishes to undertake capital expenses in the coming year, Bakker said.
The coming year will be “a tough, challenging year, but I think it is doable,” he said.
The need for St. Maarten to meet the goals set out in the targeted instruction “as soon as possible” was highlight in CFT’s separate meetings with Gibson, Council of Ministers, and Parliament. The country is not allowed to borrow any money for capital projects until all goals in the instructions are met.
“Capital investments are needed to strengthen the economy of St. Maarten, so there is an urgent need to fulfil the terms of the instruction,” he said. The deadline to meet the goals was November 1; now, there is an agreement with the Council of Ministers that the goals will be met within the framework of the 2016 budget by January 31.
Government has agreed to make some payments to service its arrears to the General Pension Fund APS and Social and Health Insurance SZV in the 2016 budget, and to spread the reminder over the coming years, said Bakker.
Achieving all the goals “…is doable. It is not easy, but it must be done in a realistic way. It must not be done in the way of the past. We must now take a different attitude,” he said.
All ministers of finance with no exclusion, after 10-10-10, have said they would raise tax compliance. “But, each time not a single dollar came out of it. Now, this minister has said you have to take a realistic view on income” thus keeping the 2016 budget at a cap of some NAf. 445 million, said Bakker. “That means some difficult choices have to be made in expenditure to come up with a balanced budget.”
Upon the return of the CFT board in March, Bakker hopes he can inform the Kingdom Council of Ministers that St. Maarten has met all of the requirements of the targeted instruction.
The meeting with Parliament’s Permanent Committed for Finance was held in Parliament House during a power outage. Bakker described it as “peculiar circumstances” adding that though there was no electricity “there was enough electricity in the air” to keep the meeting going.
Bakker welcomed the addition of a St. Maarten member on the CFT board after a vacancy stretching for more than a year. Maria van der Sluijs Plantz is “a child of St. Maarten” who knows how “to bridge the culture gaps” when these arise.
Van der Sluijs Plantz said St. Maarten has a lot of challenges. “I am determined to work myself out of a job,” she said referring to the stipulation in the Kingdom Law on Temporary Financial Supervision for Curaçao and St. Maarten, that supervision will come to an end when the country has five consecutive years of no deficit.
