And moving from the Carnival controversy to a discussion of the arrival of the IMF on October 25th, we challenged the Prime Minister to defend the position that the IMF was being brought to Belize in part because rising world fuel prices had wrecked the economy. That was not the assertion reflected in the minutes of a technical meeting the Prime Minister and his team held with the IMF in Washington on October 4th.
Jules Vasquez,
In the meeting with the IMF you told Mr. Tow, in the minutes of that meeting that I have seen, that...
Hon. Said Musa,
“Mr. Who?”
Jules Vasquez,
Mr. Tow. He is the senior advisor to Anoup Singh who is the IMF director for the Western Hemisphere. You told him that an oil price increase affects GOB as a consumer only and then Dr. Barnett said all increases are passed on to the consumer in explaining that oil prices weren’t really a factor. Is not the reason IMF has to come because we have a $110 million difference...
Hon. Said Musa,
“First of all before you ask that question let me say this. I don’t know where you got those copies of those minutes from cause those were confidential minutes. But secondly the minutes were made by an official that accompanied the delegation from the Embassy of Belize in Washington. The minutes are inaccurate. They are not official minutes. It is not true that Dr. Barnett said that all the costs of imported fuel is passed on to the consumers. So I mean whenever you get this kind of leakage...”
Jules Vasquez,
But its not fictionalized...
Hon. Said Musa,
“No, no. I am saying you got a leak of a very confidential document. I have a very good idea where it came from but what I’m saying to you is that it’s inaccurate. It’s not correct. Go on to the question.”
Jules Vasquez,
The question now is that isn’t the reason the IMF will be coming here the disparity between the $66 million projected surplus in recurrent and now what Dr. Barnett, according to the minutes of the meeting, will be a $42 million deficit on the recurrent side? This after the CAP II reclassifications.
Hon. Said Musa,
“Again it has to do with how you interpret the budget figures; if you want to do a comparison. As a matter of fact if you look at the budget estimates as presented by Minister Fonseca, his estimates show in the budget line items an overall financial gap of $81 million, I believe, which is not all far removed from the $90+ million that is now being projected for the end of the year budget deficit. We are talking about $10 million or less or there about.”
Jules Vasquez,
$95 million.
Hon. Said Musa,
“No, no but you can check it, you can get a copy of the book. In other words these figures clearly show a fiscal gap of $81 or $82 million. We are now projecting a gap of $90+ million...not far removed. That is all I am saying.”
But speaking generally about the IMF visit, the Prime Minister conceded that the somewhat tarnished reputation of Belize on the world stage does need a clean bill of health from the IMF.
Hon. Said Musa,
“The question may be asked why, why involve these people? Because this is the way the world works Jules. The truth of the matter is unless you have some kind of understanding from the IMF about what you are doing: none of the rating agencies and none of the international financial institutions would pay any attention to Belize. And we need that restoration of full confidence in Belize. That’s the truth of the matter.”
We checked "the paper", specifically Minister Fonseca's January budget address, and it projected that the overall deficit will be 2% of GDP, or $40 million, half of the Prime Minister's stated $80 million, and almost $60 million less than the now projected $95 million overall budget deficit.
_And you can check it yourself by clicking here.