Gov’t to Ensure Greater Spend of Capital Expenditure

• Minister of Finance and the Public Service, Dr. the Hon. Nigel Clarke, says the Government will be implementing measures to ensure greater Capital Expenditure (CapEx) in the upcoming fiscal year.
• Clarke, addressing the Standing Finance Committee of the House of Representatives on Tuesday (March 5), said that the projects that fell behind in the fiscal year 2023/24 were primarily due to private-sector entities that were selected through the procurement process not being able to fulfil their obligations.
• He noted that in a couple of cases, entities were not able to post the bonds required, which means that we have to do the procurement all over. In other cases, there were failures in terms of response to the procurement; that is, the responses didn’t meet the criteria and the procurement and had to be redone.
• The Minister further noted that in addition to making some changes to the procurement processes, the primary measure that the Government will take is to be in a position where there are more projects available than budgeted capacity, which will allow more flexibility when one is falling behind.
• This is particularly important as the country runs the risk of falling behind if it cannot grow and execute its CapEx at a required rate.

 (Source: JIS)