The Daily Herald

PHILIPSBURG--The Committee for Financial Supervision CFT informed Lt. Governor Franklyn Richards in December 2009 that the budget for 2010, as submitted by the Executive Council, lacked vital information and was unclear in certain instances.
Therefore, CFT could not render a positive advice on the budget and gave the Executive Council until January 14 to rectify or clarify a number of issues it identified.
The letter to the Lt. Governor dated December 16, 2009, urged the Executive Council to provide the essential information that would allow CFT to determine if the budget was realistic and feasible.
The committee also stressed that without essential justification of certain issues in the budget as submitted, in particular as they pertained to Country St. Maarten, the Island Territory should expect a negative advice from CFT. It also noted that multi-annual budgets of the Island Territory would always reflect a deficit if realistic measures weren't put in place.
Since that letter was sent, CFT has reported that it had no problem with the late handling of the budget by the Island Council, as it (CFT) had not finished with it. Therefore, there has been no indication whether the explanations provided by the Executive Council were satisfactory enough to CFT for it to grant a positive advice.
Commissioner of Finance Xavier Blackman said a response to the December 16 letter had been sent to CFT and technical consultations had taken place as well. In the meantime, the Democratic Party faction has written to the Lt. Governor requesting that same information (see related story).
Among the issues highlighted in the budget, CFT questioned how the deficit of 2009 had been handled, why estimates for 2010 were so much higher than in previous years, and how the 2009 deficit would affect the budgets of 2010 and beyond. CFT also noted that all explanations provided only referred to the budget for 2010, but preferably would be an outline of how the budgets for following years would be affected based on stipulations for 2010.
The committee also wanted an explanation of how the figures pertaining to GEBE had been arrived at, considering that the budget stipulated the introduction of a concession fee of NAf. 5 million to be paid by GEBE. The figures CFT questioned apparently were more than the NAf. 5 million. The figures and explanation for garbage collection also were not clear to CFT.
With regard to Country St. Maarten and related tasks, CFT questioned how Government had calculated and justified an amount of NAf. 18 million for the execution of these tasks and what assumptions had been used to determine the scope of the financial obligations.