30546: Durban (comment0: re 30537 Ricker on Haitian Debt Relief (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

Lance Durban <Lpdurban@yahoo.com> posts...

I forwarded Ricker's post #30537 on Haiti's debt and debt forgiveness
to a well-connected friend in Haiti, which precipitated this little
exchange, posted here with permission and in the interests of fiscal
transparency:

   Lance,

   I went to a meeting last night Senat/Private Sector about
   the revisions to the current budget asked for by the Govt.
   They are now projecting revenues of G25b instead of G22b
   that they budgeted for.

   The scariest part of the presentation was the fact that
   according to Govt. numbers Haitian Ministries only managed
   to spend about 14% of their budgets in the first 6 months
   of the current fiscal year.  TPTC had spent less than 4%.
   This is where all those promised jobs are, locked up in
   unspent money.
                           (name withheld)

To which I replied:

Hmm, that's interesting, if hard to believe.  Who, exactly, audits
the government's books?  If the "b" is supposed to be billion
gourdes and the numbers are ANNUAL revenue figures, that would
come to $675 million dollars.  And, if the gov't is taking in all
of those gourdes and not spending any, no wonder that the gourde
is strengthening in value relative to the dollar.

To which my Haitian contact replied:

   Here are the hard numbers to go with (my previous) comments:

Etat d'execution du Budget 2006-2007 d'Octobre a Mars 2007 En millions
de Gdes
                                        Credits   Credits   %
                                       Octroyes   Utilises
Ministere de la Planification et
       de la Cooperation Externe          9216       440    4.8%
Ministere de l'Economie et des Finances   4957       886   17.9%
Ministere de l'Agriculture des
       Ressources Naturelles              3778       268    7.1%
Ministere des Travaux Publics,
       Transport & Communications        11860       417    3.5%
Ministere de Commerce et de l'Industrie    423        85   20.1%
Ministere de l'Environnement               881       110   12.5%
Ministere de Tourisme                      159        61   38.4%
Ministere de la Justice et Securite
       Publique                           5599      1895   33.8%
Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres          882       516   58.5%
La Presidence                              508       268   52.8%
Bureau de Premier Ministre                 577       227   39.3%
Ministere de l'Interieur et des
       Collectivites Terretoriales        1576       220   14.0%
Ministere de l'Education Nationale
       et a la Formation                  5694      1249   21.9%
Ministere des Affaires Sociales
       et du Travail                       454       167   36.8%
Ministere de la Sante Publique et
      de la Population                    5435       649   11.9%
Ministere de la Jeunesse, des Sports
      et de l'Action Civique               295        98   33.2%
                                         ------   ------  ------
                                         52294      7556   14.4%

------------------

Irrespective of the numbers in this table, and putting things into
perspective, it is interesting to note that the US$ 1.6 billion
estimate of foreign remittances we have heard reported on Corbett is
more than double the entire Haitian govt budget.

Lance Durban