Prime Minister (PM) James Marape has put out a statement refuting what he says are claims made by one of the daily newspapers that the country is facing a cash crisis.
In that statement, Marape refuted claims in an article by Post-Courier on Tuesday 25th June 2024, which stated that the government is presently experiencing a cash crisis.
He said this is not true and assures the public, business houses, stakeholders and investors that government accounts are being managed prudently by Treasury, and Finance and Planning, with revenue collection pushing 50 percent (50%).
PM Marape said, “Every week, there is a budget management committee that sits to ensure that government priorities are being retired, as we collect revenue and disburse the expenditures as we go.
“As I speak, up to today, we have collected 42 percent (42%) of our envisaged revenue totaling over K8.4 billion.
“So, we collect and pay as we go; we are managing our cash flow to make sure that what we collect go to essential and recurrent expenditures in the first instance, then our core development budget.
“There is no issue with cash in the country,” PM Marape further stressed.
To prove this, Marape said Treasury will release the mid-year fiscal economic outlook report to the public at the end of the month to fully outline spending past mid-year and the economic management for 2024.
“I want to assure all our stakeholders in the country that there is no cash crisis. We are paying for expenditures as budgeted; all expenditure is consistent with our funding plan in Budget 2024.
“We are managing our finances well, as we have done over the last five years including the toughest years of 2022 and 2023 with COVID-19.
“We have a temporary advance facility with Central Bank of up to K1.5 billion which we fall back on when we need to because our fiscal management is reliable and Central Bank trusts us as we have not defaulted since 2019,” said the Prime Minister.