By Alieu Amara Suwu
Honourable Francis Amara Kaisamba, Constituency 020, Kenema District, commencing the debate on the appropriation bill on 28 November 2022, thanked the Ministry of Finance for a tremendous work done.
Hon Kaisamba said the budget is people centered and rhymes with the current situation in the world. He added that the theme of the 2023 Budget is deliberate for it gives a brief overview of what happened in 2022, viz-a -viz the prevailing circumstances such has Russia/Ukraine war that has caused a ripple effect of the country’s economy and other sectors.
He noted that it is the reason why the National Revenue Authority could not hit its target; that notwithstanding, government has done so well in mitigating the challenges, there is basic commodities though they may be high in prices but for the fact they are available that gives assurance that government is doing well compared to other countries like Liberia and Ghana. He noted that the government in midst of the global crisis has navigated its way through even against powerful nations.
He said in 2023, there are basis things government will address such as food security – a lot of money will be allocated to agriculture – and the Toma Bum project is in progress which will address food issues. On education and health sectors, he said are key interventions government has focused the budget on: for government to allocate 22% of the of the budget to education, is huge progress, which he advised the Committee on education to be monitoring the educational system to maintain fairness especially in ensuring PIN codes are not given biasedly.
On inflation, he did accept that there is inflation because they import almost everything which grossly affects the Leones value as against the US Dollar. He highlighted remedies to solve problems of foreign exchange and curb the current inflationary trend. He did say government has also employed more health workers despite the challenges in the sector. He also said government has constructed township roads more so in Kenema and Kenema is contributing to the GDP of the country so they are pleased of the good work done for them.
He said the job done in the electricity sector is great which has lit the whole Kenema district and today Kenema is benefit from 24 hour electricity. He noted that the Sierra Leone Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC) should be allocated the budget required because they will be providing information on election activities and they have providing live coverage for Parliament especially during the budget debate.
On the midterm economic outlook, the Minister of Finance, Denice Vandi, reading the budget speech few weeks ago said, the midterm economy is also challenging in the wake of the overlapping crises; current projections indicate that growth will not return to the pre-pandemic levels until 2025 and is projected to increase to only 3.1 percent in 2023. He said, for its part, inflation is projected to decline only gradually to 23.7 percent in 2023; however, it is projected to drop further to 14.3 percent by 2025.
Addressing food insecurity, the Minister said the World Food Programme (WFP) estimates that as of April this year, 1.1 million or 13.4 percent of the population, is facing acute hunger and 2 million are experiencing chronic hunger. He also noted that, as a net importer of food, the ongoing crises threaten to worsen an already precarious food security situation. Against this backdrop, he noted that Government’s most pressing objectives in the food security area are to meet the immediate food security needs of the most vulnerable, protect against a deterioration of the nutrition status of children, and boost local production of a diversified food basket while laying the food foundation for medium to long term investments for boosting agriculture productivity.
Strengthening the Quality of Higher, Technical and Vocational Education, he said to consolidate the significant gains that have been made in higher, technical and vocational education and scale up interventions in this subsector, Government will enhance the implementation of the Student Loan Scheme, complete the development of the National Qualification Framework for TVET and enhance activities for the establishment of the Kono University of Science and Technology Strengthening Primary Health Care.
