Dear Editor,
Sorry, but news last week that the World Bank commission for managing the reconstruction fund would be up to 10 per cent or 50M euros? Is this an April Fool’s joke? The only reason for using the "World Bank is to protect the integrity of the loans to ensure that no funds go missing, but a 50M-euro service fee? That’s enough to build a new GEBE power plant, half the proposed new hospital, or 10 new schools. On top of that, the World Bank integrity measures have us so tied up in bureaucracy and red tape that here we are seven months later and not one check has been written.
I have said it before, the fastest way to reboot our economy and get everybody back to work is to help the hotels rebuild. Instead of trying to encourage new (Chinese) resort developers, invest in the ones that are here and already committed. Lend the funds directly to the existing hoteliers at 0 per cent interest over 20 years, drawing payments as the rebuild is completed, with each hotel securing a second mortgage on their properties. That way if they don’t pay it back we have the hotels as collateral. A simple lesson in fiscal management, we don’t need the World Bank and can save 50M euros.
I heard a rumor yesterday that Holland is going to give us the full 450M as a grant and not a loan (God bless the Dutch). Fiscal management lesson number 2, how do you turn 450M into 900M? Loan the 450M to people that have to pay it back! So you can loan it out again.
Name withheld at author’s request.
