MVR 1.7 billion supplementary budget to be decided within a day

The speaker of the parliament Mohamed Nasheed has asked to speed up the process of the supplementary budget proposed by the Finance Ministry so that it can be finalized within one day.

The Finance Ministry has asked for a supplementary budget of an additional MVR 1.7 billion after it was predicted that the government spending will surpass the MVR 30.2 billion budgeted for the year. Nor further details regarding the budget has been revealed from the Parliament or the Finance Ministry.

Speaker Nasheed stated that the supplementary budget presented by the Finance Minister will be sent to a committee consisting of members from the Public Accounts Committee and Committee on Economic Affairs. He also asked for work on analyzing the budget to be conducted all day and to prepare the final budget for tomorrow night.

"My target is for work to be conducted today and tomorrow on the budget, and reach a final decision to be presented to the parliament by tomorrow night," said the speaker.

Finance Minister Ahmed Ameer had previously stated that the current government was functioning on a budget that was presented to the parliament by the previous administration and due to that reason, the current administration had been facing a lot of difficulties. The Minister also stated that it would be extremely difficult to carry on without supplementing the budget.

The parliament had passed a budget of MVR 30.2 billion for the year which is a deficit budget of MVR four billion. Around MVR 13.2 billion has been spent so far from the budget allocated for 2019. The supplementary budget if approved from the parliament will raise the total budget for the year to MVR 32 billion and raise the deficit to MVR 4.9 billion as well.