The National Assembly yesterday passed the Supplemen-tary Appropriation Bill (No. 1 for 2007) approving $8.679 billion for current and capital expenditure.
Financial Paper 1/2007 covered current and capital estimates totalling $1.6 billion for the period April 17, 2007 to November 07, 2007, while Financial Paper 2/2007 covers current and capital estimates totalling $7.011 billion for the period ending December 31, 2007.
Members of the Opposition raised the question that many of the items for which provisions were being sought could have been adequately covered in the preparation of the national budget.
In defending a $54 million subvention for the Board of Industrial Training, Labour Minister Manzoor Nadir said the money was necessary for the training of young people who did not have a chance to finish formal education.
He said it was for the commencement of the second phase of the national training programmes aimed at out-of-school young people.
Alliance for Change (AFC) Member of Parliament Khemraj Ramjattan called for the Board of Industrial Training to present reports to the National Assembly so that members could see how such significant sums of money were being spent.
The Guyana Elections Commission received an allocation of $206 million for the procurement of equipment and supplies for the commencement of house-to-house registration. And the Unserved Areas Electrification Programme received a boost of $1.2 billion to meet additional local resources in its electrification drive.
PNCR-1G Member of Parliament Winston Murray expressed the opinion that the government should bring supplementary project profiles for requests for large sums from the Contingencies Fund, which the government continues to “raid.”
A provision was made for $166 million to meet costs associated with the hosting of the Rio Group Summit and the Commonwealth Finance Ministers Meeting. Some of this was to meet the expenses of hosting delegates of the two meetings at Buddy’s Hotel, Minister of Finance Dr Ashni Singh said.
Also passed with amendments was the Deeds Registry Authority (Amendment) Bill 2007 after Attorney Doodnauth Singh moved the second reading of the legislation aimed at amending the Deeds Registry Authority Act of 1999.