WE ARE A BANANA REPUBLIC DEPENDING ON OUTSIDE FINANCING DESPITE HAVING MINES – SICHINGA … UPND adm will struggle to finance pronouncements
Former Commerce minister Bob Sichinga says the UPND administration will struggle to finance what he describes as their good pronouncements because the country’s major mining sector is only contributing K9 billion to the K167 billion budget.
Speaking with Daily Revelation on the 2023 national budget presented by Finance minister Dr Musokotwane last Friday, Sichinga said the UPND administration is struggling with a lack of finance while wanting to meet costs and expectations of the people.
He said looking at the budget from the general pronouncements, the socio and political point, many of the things the administration said were very good, but the important thing was to focus at the structure of the economy.
Sichinga said he was looking at the table of content, containing the revenues and expenditure, saying this was not just the problem of the current government but it has always affected the previous governments as well.
He said the total budget for this year was K167 billion, which was just over $10 billion, saying looking at the functions, the general public services accounted to K66 billion representing 40 percent of the total budget, defence at five percent, public order and safety is nine percent and environmental protection one percent, health 10.5 percent, education 14 percent and social protection five percent.
Sichinga said all these were desirable as they were pointing towards the right direction in terms of where the country should spend the money, but the question was where the money to finance the same programmes will come from.
He said looking at the revenues, domestic revenue was K111 billion, and that all the taxes put together were only giving about K93 billion to the treasury and that the known taxes were K18 billion.
“How much of it is coming from the mines? K9 billion. What does that represent? Eight percent. We are a mining country, where would we expect the revenues to come from? From mining. And I am saying to you just look at the resource envelope on page 49, it’s telling you that.. http://dailyrevelationzambia.com/we-are-a-banana-republic-depending-on-outside-financing-despite-having-mines-sichinga-upnd-administration-will-struggle-to-finance-their-pronouncements/