By Bill W. Cooper
Members of the House of Representatives are expected to pass into law FY 2022 recast budget without proper scrutiny if a motion for reconsideration proffered by Maryland County Rep., P. Mike Jury fails to be tried.
On Thursday, July 7, 2022, the members of the House of Representatives voted for the passage of the 2022 recast budget at US$806,587,341 without scrutiny of the document.
The lawmakers however passed the instrument just as it was presented from the Executive Branch of government without exercising their oversight responsibility by looking through the budget.
The instrument was not sent to the Liberian Senate for concurrence because of Rep. Jury’s motion of reconsideration which will on today decide as to whether the previous decision by plenary for the passage of the budget will stand or not.
Because, Rep., Jury that also voted to pass the recast budget, smartly filed his motion for reconsideration in an attempt to prevent Rep. Yekeh Kolubah, who opposed the budget-passage from filing a similar motion.
As per the Houses’ rules and procedures, every motion for reconsideration shall be decided by a majority vote, and if the House refuses to reconsider or withdraws the motion for reconsideration, or if the House affirms its first decision after reconsideration, no further motion for reconsideration shall be entertained.
Additionally, a motion to reconsider may be put on the table without affecting the question in reference, as the action to be taken will be the final disposition of the motion for reconsideration.
Hence, the failure by the lawmakers to perform their oversight responsibility also violates Section 36 of the Public Financial Management Act of 2009 and legislative procedures.
Section 36 of the Public Financial Management Act of 2009 among other things, provides that each spending entity of the GOL shall, prior to the submission of its budget to the Legislature, present to the Legislature a Budget Performance Report covering the first three quarters of the current budget year.
Although the 4G passage of the recast budget now reflects an upward adjustment of over US $20 million or 2.9% over the originally approved budget of US $786,587,340 previously passed by the Legislature; normally, when the budget is introduced in the chambers of the Legislature, it is turned over to the Committees on Ways, Means and Finance for scrutiny and that copies be distributed to each lawmaker before passage.
But that was not done despite calls from several lawmakers for the instrument to be forwarded to the Houses’ Committees on Ways, Means and Finance for scrutiny before passage and copies be given to them, but a controversial motion for wrongful passage of budget into law was then made by Montserrado County District 8 Representative, Moses Acarous Gray.
“Having listened to the reading, “I move if I can obtain a second from the body, this first reading constitutes the second, the third, which becomes the final reading, passed and sent to the Liberian Senate for concurrence,” Gray said in his motion.
What is in the FY 2022 Recast Budget was duly communicated by President Weah, saying that the submission of the budget is from the backdrop and context that the restatement is necessitated by the need to address urgent and unforeseen National expenditure demands through reprioritization of the country’s spending plan.
“Recent economic challenges have become very daunting as the stark realities of spiraling prices of basic commodities take hold in the wake of global economic uncertainties resulting from the Russia and Ukraine crisis,” the President stated.
“The total revenue envelope for the proposed Restated Budget is US$806,587,341, reflecting a net upward adjustment of US$20,000,001, or 2.9 percent over the originally approved budget of US$785,587,340,” he added.
According to the President’s letter the extra fiscal space was yielded through internal reprioritization of existing programs, identifying additional resources, as well as a World Bank Loan of US$15,000,000.
Recurrent expenditure is estimated to be US$ 648,552,000 or seventy-nine percent of total proposed expenditure, while expenditure for public sector investment is estimated to be US$158,035,000 or twenty-one percent of total proposed expenditure.
Additional recurrent allocations have been made in the Restated Budget for critical objects of expenditure such as Pension for Retired Civil Servants, Subsidy for Provision of Electricity and Repayment of a Foreign Obligation that has diminished.
Here is a breakdown of recurrent allocations by major expenditure object as captured in the President’s communication to the House:
Goods and Services are put at US$4,000,000, Debt Service: 1,500,000 while Social Benefits: 2,500,000 Totaling 8,000,000 as the Public Sector Investment Expenditure highlights allocations for Public Sector Investment Projects (PSIP) in the restatement including allocations for Obligations to the CLSG Electricity Grid, Rice Stabilization, Community Development Project, completion of the 15th Judicial Circuit Court Complex in River Gee County and the 3rd Judicial Circuit Court Complex in Sinoe County and allocation for Solid Waste Management.
The Liberian Chief Executive told the Legislative Body through his Communication on Thursday 7th July that Liberians have all observed the potential risk of disadvantaged youths for whom the Gov’t must take actions to reform them.
Thus, his Government has also allocated US$1,000,000 for an Annual National At-Risk Youth Program. The total amount earmarked for PSIP is US$33,375,000.
